During the climate summit in Durban in December 2011, researchers of the Ecologic Institute presented insights from the ongoing research project CLICO on several occasions. CLICO undertakes research on how changes in water availability caused by climate change will affect human security and conflicts over water. Climate change is likely to have negative impacts on food security in many places and may exacerbate water scarcity; however, preliminary results of CLICO indicate that "water wars" resulting from climate change are an unlikely scenario. A presentation and two event reports are available for download.

During the first week of the UNFCCC Conference of the Parties (COP17), Christiane Gerstetter presented these findings as well as the overall design of the CLICO ( project as part of an event hosted by DG Research & Innovation of the European Commission.  The event served to showcase climate-related research that, like CLICO, is funded out of the 7^th Research Framework of the EU. The Earth Negotiation Bulletin [pdf, 2.1 MB, English] reported on the event.

The relationship between climate change, human security and conflicts was also discussed in a panel discussion that Matthias Duwe, Head of Climate at Ecologic Institute, moderated.  Speakers from the the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zürich), Initiatives of Change, the UN Convention to Combat Desertification, Third Generation Environmentalism and others presented theoretical and more practical insights during this COP side event. The event was co-organised by ETH Zürich, Initiatives of Change and Ecologic Institute.  The Earth Negotiation Bulletin [pdf, 2.5 MB, English] produced a story on the event.

Moreover, Christiane Gerstetter also presented CLICO to a wider South African public at the Climate Change Response Expo. The expo was organized by the South Africa government to educate the general public about climate change.  Speaking to an audience of Durban citizens, Christiane Gerstetter thus tried to explain how social scientists work when undertaking climate-related research and clarified why their insights are relevant to societies.

A presentation [pdf, 675 KB, English] by Christiane Gerstetter is available for download.