On 5 December 2016, World Soil Day, an EU Soil stakeholders' Conference took place in Brussels. The conference aimed at raising awareness about the importance of soils and the ecosystem services that they deliver, and to contribute to the implementation of the EU Soil Thematic Strategy. The proceedings are available for download.

The Federal Environment Agency was hosting the 3rd National Resources Forum with support of Ecologic Institute on 11 November 2016. The conference took place in the "Ludwig Erhard Haus" in Berlin. The aim of the National Resources Forum (NRF) is to provide a national platform for discussion of the issue of sustainable resource use by focusing on the political and scientific debate on this subject.

Ecologic Institute supported the Federal Environment Agency in organising the 3rd European Resources Forum from 9 until 10 November 2016. The conference took place in the "Ludwig Erhard Haus" in Berlin. The ERF addresses European decision-makers and experts from the fields of policy development, industry, academia, civil society and the media. Around 400 participants from over 32 countries participated in the conference.

Ecologic Institute supported the German Environment Agency in hosting the Conference "Decarbonization and Resource Efficiency – 100% Renewable Energy and more," which took place on 8 November 2016 at the "Ludwig Erhard Haus" in Berlin. The conference highlighted synergies and ways to minimize trade-offs between decarbonization and dematerialization policies.

The final conference of the project "Post-carbon cities of tomorrow" (POCACITO) led by Ecologic Institute, will take place on Friday, 21 October 2016 in Brussels. At the interactive conference we will present our experience in developing long-term strategies with stake-holders through visioning and backcasting workshops and other results of the project, such as a high level document or 'roadmap' to achieve livable post-carbon cities by 2050. Registration is now open!

Vivienne Parry welcomed approximately 1700 attendees from over 100 countries to the fourth edition of Adaptation Futures 2016, one of the largest conferences ever held on climate change adaptation. The Bottom-Up Climate Adaptation Strategies (BASE) project was selected to be featured as a best practice project at the conference. BASE partners, among them Ecologic Institute, presented the project's research and tools in two sessions.

After the success of the ECCA conference in 2015, the BASE project has been selected as a Best Practice project to be featured at the upcoming Adaptation Futures (AF 2016) Conference from10 until 13 May 2016, in Rotterdam (the Netherlands). BASE partners will present the project's research and tools in two sessions, several presentations and a variety of information material. Key adaptation tools developed within the projects will also be presented in the Tool Shed.

On 21 April 2016, the final conference of the EU-FP7 funded project “POLIMP” took place in Brussels. How can climate policies be designed, what impacts do they have and what other options are there? These are important questions to stakeholders and policy-makers. The project POLIMP aims at making answers to these issues more easily accessible and understandable. To this end, POLIMP examines knowledge gaps for different policy and decision making levels and covers these with the help of existing research results.

The conference "Cities and Climate Change – the deluge ahead" on the prevention, adaptation and management of heavy rainfalls took place in Münster on 7 April 2016. The conference brought together 180 participants from management, policy, science, consultancy and practice and was organized by the Ministry for Climate Protection, Environment, Agriculture, Conservation and Consumer Protection of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia (MKULNV) and the Ministry for Economic Affairs, Energy, Building, Housing and Transport of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia (MBWSV). The objective of the conference was to provide a platform for dialogue and exchange between the participants. The knowledge transfer was aimed at increasing the awareness of climate impacts as well as showing the need for prevention.

In the project "Scientific coordination of research projects on a sustainable economy" (Wissenschaftliche Koordination der Fördermaßnahme Nachhaltiges Wirtschaften, NaWiKo) Ecologic Institute and its partners coordinate 30 research projects, which deal with a more sustainable economy and are supported by the Federal Ministry for Education and Research (Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, BMBF).

The final conference of the EU-funded research project "European Action to Fight Environmental Crime" (EFFACE) took place on 17 and 18 February 2016 in Brussels. More than 100 participants attended the conference - including representatives of EU institutions, national environmental authorities, police, civil society as well as academic experts on the topic from the EU and beyond. 

"Sort of best friends?" was the title of a conference which took place on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the IÖW and VÖW on 2 November 2015. The Ecological Research Network (Ecornet) – of which Ecologic Institute is a member – along with the civil society players Friends of the Earth Germany (BUND), Nature and Biodiversity Conservation Union (NABU), Brot für die Welt and Zivilgesellschaftliche Plattform Forschungswende hosted the event.

On 15 October 2015, the final conference of the Network for Green Economy Indicators (NETGREEN) project, which is led by Ecologic Institute, will take place. There, national and regional green economy strategies, including best practices, will be discussed. Furthermore, the "measuring-progress.eu" web tool, the final output of the NETGREEN project, which makes green economy indicators accessible, will be presented. Registration is open and the event is free of charge.

Ecologic Institute celebrated 20 years of successful environmental research and policy consulting with a podium discussion, improvisational theatre, and a festive reception in Berlin. To further mark the occasion of our anniversary, we presented an infographic providing a peek behind the scenes and introducing the people working at Ecologic Institute. More information and photos of the celebration, the infographic and the 20 messages of greeting sent from Germany, Europe and beyond can be found in the further links.

On 30 September 2015, the conference "SmartSOIL: sustainable soil management aimed at reducing threats to soils under climate change" took place in Brussels. The conference concluded the 4-year research project SmartSOIL funded by the 7th Framework Programme.