Dear partners, friends and colleagues,
Season’s greetings from the UNU Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability!
This has been a special year for UNU-IAS, celebrating our 10th anniversary. It has been an honour to reflect on the institute’s many achievements and lasting impacts in advancing “Synergies for Sustainability”, while envisioning our future priorities. In this spirit, I am delighted to share a few highlights from our recent activities.
In the past two months UNU-IAS has made prominent contributions to key UN conferences for biodiversity, climate change and desertification. At the UN Biodiversity Conference (CBD COP16) in Cali, Colombia we promoted landscape approaches and youth participation in decision-making, bringing university students to join the discussion in person.
We were in Baku for the 2024 UN Climate Conference (COP29), which agreed a new global pledge of $300 billion annual climate financing for developing countries. UNU-IAS events addressed integrated policymaking as well as youth engagement — featuring two high school students from Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan as part of our delegation.
This month UNU-IAS joined COP16 of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) in Riyadh — the largest ever UN land conference. We advanced discussion on how landscape approaches can support more coherent policies and land use decisions.
The future of multilateral cooperation was at the top of the global agenda this year, as the UN Secretary-General convened the Summit of the Future in September. At the summit in New York world leaders adopted the Pact for the Future — a pledge to build a more peaceful, sustainable and inclusive world. UNU-IAS provided inputs on the evolving role of think tanks for the SDGs, as part of a side event organized by the Asian Development Bank and the Rockefeller Foundation.
Turning to our education activities, we are delighted to have all of our postgraduate students from across the globe here in Tokyo, interacting with UNU-IAS experts in person and joining our international conferences and research projects. In August we organized the 40th UNU Global Seminar in Ishikawa Prefecture, with a focus on disaster recovery and resilience building after the 2024 Noto Peninsula Earthquake. UNU-IAS is supporting the region’s recovery through our Operating Unit Ishikawa / Kanazawa (OUIK), building on its strong links with local communities.
Our new e-learning course, Net Zero 101, has now attracted more than 10,000 enrolments. This free course is a valuable resource for anyone interested in the topic, highlighting practical steps that each of us can take for climate action.
UNU-IAS has also been active in the media, informing global dialogue on sustainability through The Japan News, Japan Today, The Diplomat, Africa Renewal, Diplomatic Courier, Nippon TV and the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan, among others.
This is only a small selection of the diverse work of UNU-IAS across the globe. To receive monthly updates on our latest news and opportunities please sign up for our email newsletter, UNU-IAS CONNECT.
On behalf of everyone at UNU-IAS I am deeply grateful for your support and partnership in our work towards a more sustainable future. As we enter the institute’s second decade, I am excited to embark on the next stage of our journey together.
With very best wishes for the holiday season and a Happy New Year,
Shinobu Yume Yamaguchi
Director, UNU-IAS
