$63 million to be invested by São Paulo Research Foundation on climate research

A pledge of a US$63 million investment initiative for research on global climate change and its impact on Brazil has been announced by The State of São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP).

Over the next ten years, FAPESP will offer US$6–7 million every year to climate researchers. FAPESP will also look to bring in other institutions to add more funding to the programme.

The two first proposal calls are for research on the development of a global climate model and on the causes, impacts and needs for adaptation to climate change.

A US$10 million initial investment for this will be shared between FAPESP and the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq).

"We hope to support research in several scientific areas, because real problems are interdisciplinary," Carlos Henrique de Brito Cruz, FAPESP scientific director, told SciDev.Net.

Climate change can, for example, have effects on agriculture and human health.

The FAPESP programme will also finance the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research (INPE) to buy equipment to develop global climate models.

"A supercomputer will calculate worldwide temperature, humidity, winds, and more. This information will help Sao Paulo researchers to model how climate events are related to each other," says Brito.

This will be the first time Brazilian specialists will be able to harness such major processing power to develop global climate models, he says.

According to Brito, the new instrument will generate scenarios that will be useful to both researchers and policymakers.

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Source: Scidev.net