
11 October 2016
United Nations Secretary General visits UNU training programmes in Iceland
Recently, Mr Ban Ki-moon, UN´s Secretary General attended a meeting with representatives from the four UNU training programmes in Iceland – the Land Restoration, Geothermal, Fisheries and Gender Equality training programmes. The meeting took place at the National Museum of Iceland and the UNU-LRT Director, Dr Hafdis Hanna Aegisdotttir, introduced the activities and missions of the four respective programmes and how they meet the challenges presented in the newly adopted United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

16 September 2016
Graduation at UNU-LRT
The annual six-month training programme came to an end this week when 11 specialists graduated from the programme at a ceremony at Keldnaholt research campus of the Agricultural University of Iceland. The total number of graduated fellows has now reached 87 of which 48% have been women and 52% men. The fellows this year came from seven different countries in Central Asia and Africa: Ghana, Kyrgyzstan, Lesotho, Malawi, Mongolia, Niger and Uganda. Lesotho is a new UNU-LRT partner country and this was the first time that fellows from Lesotho participated in the training programme.

15 September 2016
International conference on grazing
The international conference "Grazing in a changing Nordic region" is held in Reykjavik Iceland this week. The conference brings together specialists, academics and policymakers for an interdisciplinary exchange of knowledge and experiences, with the hope to contribute to sustainable management of land utilized for grazing. The fellows in the UNU-LRT six-month training programme participate in the conference and gave a presentation, titled Land tenure and policy implications on grazing: lessons from Africa and Central Asia. Ms Malipholo Eleanor Hae from Lesotho gave the talk on behalf of the UNU-LRT fellows. The talk was very well received and generated stimulating discussion.

6 September 2016
Fellows present research findings in an open seminar
The UNU-LRT fellows reached an important milestone in the six-month training programme this week when they presented the results of their individual research projects in an open seminar at the research campus of the Agricultural University of Iceland. As always, the individual projects spanned a range of topics including: assessment of the impact of cultivation on soil organic carbon; assessment of the impact of tree species on soil fertility in farmers’ fields in Niger; studies on the degradation of rangelands in Kyrgyzstan and Lesotho; and research on the effect of sand mines in Northern Ghana on the livelihood of local people and the ability of authorities to improve the situation with restoration interventions.

18 August 2016
Fellows on field excursion
During the six-month training in Iceland, the UNU-LRT fellows go on two different field excursions. Last week the fellows undertook their second field excursion, this time to the West and North Iceland. The focus was on land degradation in Iceland, implementation of restoration work, restoration vs. reclamation and an introduction to Icelandic cultural background through stories and historical sites.

4 July 2016
Climate change focus in field excursion
Last week the UNU-LRT fellows went on a three day excursion to the south and southeast of Iceland. The focus of the trip was on climate change and how it affects ecosystems and societies in the area. In the trip, the fellows got a good overview of how glaciers can tell us about past climate and be used as indicators of climate change. The Vatnajökull National Park was visited where the fellows walked up to the outlet glacier Skaftafellsjökull and observed how the glacier has retreated during the last century and how the rate of retreat has increased in the last decades.