RISE
What is RISE?
Human changes to the environment, like climate change and habitat loss, are increasingly threatening the sustainability of social-ecological systems at a global scale. Stewards of the natural capital of over a quarter of the world's surface area, Indigenous Peoples (IPs) are particularly exposed and sensitive to these changes because of their intimate subsistence, cultural and spiritual bounds with nature.
Traditional food systems (TFS) can be defined as the "all food within a particular culture available from local natural resources and culturally accepted". They represent one of the most prominent components of indigenous socio-ecological systems (ISES), providing not only nutritious and diverse food but also crucial socioeconomic, cultural and spiritual assets. However, proper understanding of how future climate change may compromise TFS through alterations of related human-nature interactions is still lacking.
RISE (Climate change Resilience of Indigenous SocioEcological systems) is a joint international project that aims at filling this knowledge gap by understanding the socioeconomic and nutritional contributions of ITFS and the risks from future climate and environmental changes to promote sustainable development and adaptation.
Project structure
RISE joins research teams from Japan, Russia and Thailand with complementary expertise and a history of collaboration with Indigenous Communities to undertake a comprehensive analysis of the socioeconomic and nutritional contributions of traditional food systems towards sustainable indigenous livelihoods and welfare, and investigating the potential implications of future changes to TFS under alternative futures of varying carbon emission and social response scenarios. In partnership with the indigenous communities and other local stakeholders, RISE is strategically designed to deliver novel and robust science that will contribute towards the integration of indigenous issues within the climate change and sustainable agendas while generating a forum for discussion to promote positive co-management and regional development through sustainability and climate change adaptation.
RISE uses a comparative case study approach coupling on-site socioeconomic, nutritional, and ecological surveys of target ISES of Sakha (Republic of Sakha, Russian Federation) and Karen (Kanchanaburi, Thailand) people with statistical models (species distribution models) projecting future changes in the distribution and composition of traditional food species under contrasting alternative emission scenarios and shared socioeconomic pathways (RCP-SSPs). Results presented as alternative narratives of future climate change impacts on TFS will be integrated into a risk assessment framework to explore potential vulnerabilities of these communities operating through altered TFS, and possible adaptation options through stakeholder consultation so lessons learned can be applied in practice.
You can learn more about the communities we are working with and associated environments and traditional food systems in the CASE STUDIES section. Specific details on methodology and expected project results can be consulted from our project research protocol available from the RESULTS section.
RISE is funded under the East Asia Science and Innovation Area Joint
Research Program (e-ASIA JRP) and supported by the Japanese Science and Technology Agency (JST SICORP Grant Number JPMJSC20E5), the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (RFBR project number 21-55-70104), and the Thai National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA Grant Number P-21-50260).
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