The Fridtjof Nansen Institute has been awarded ‘Strategic Institute Initiative’ funding (Strategisk Instituttsatsning) from the Research Council of Norway. This will enable a further strengthening of our research on how global environmental governance contributes to poverty alleviation.

FNI will apply the strategic initiative funding to conduct research on how international environmental governance and resource management can promote poverty alleviation in developing countries. Specifically, we aim to provide information and guidance to national authorities and stakeholders on how Norway can contribute to poverty alleviation, through its involvement in international negotiations as well as through development cooperation.

FNI’s research under this umbrella will focus on seven topics:

1. Seed security: how implementation of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture can contribute to seed and food security and poverty alleviation in rural areas of developing countries and thus to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals in this regard;
2. Bioeconomy and biotechnology: how new biotechnology and bioeconomy can be managed nationally and internationally, with a view to achieving positive effects on poverty reduction;
3. Intergovernmental Panel on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services: how new global biodiversity goals can contribute to poverty reduction, as a global follow-up of the conclusions of the IPBES;
4. Oceans and sea-level rise: how international law processes related to climate change and rising sea levels can be directed towards safeguarding human rights and poverty reduction;
5. China in Africa: how China's growing presence in Africa affects development cooperation and poverty reduction in light of the UN Sustainable Development Goals;
6. Environmental law and the Aarhus Convention: how the Aarhus Convention (the UNECE Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters) and other democratizing environmental legislation can contribute to poverty reduction;
7. Dialogue and dissemination: strengthen the dialogue and exchange of knowledge between Norway’s development cooperation authorities, other relevant ministries, non-governmental development cooperation actors and international organizations.

This seventh topic is cross-sectional and applies to all the above topics.