SISC - Società Italiana per le Scienze del Clima in co-operation with AGI - Associazione Geofisica Italiana, AIEAR - Associazione Italiana degli Economisti dell'Ambiente e delle Risorse naturali, ATIt - Associazione Teriologica Italiana, CATAP - Coordinamento delle Associazioni Tecnico-scientifiche per l’Ambiente ed il Paesaggio, COI - Commissione Oceanografica Italiana, GII - Gruppo italiano di Idraulica, HOS – Historical Oceanography Society, SIF - Società Italiana di Fisica, SMI - Società Meteorologica Italiana, and UNASA - Unione delle Accademie di Agricoltura

is pleased to open the Call for Abstracts for Rome 2015 Science Symposium on Climate (http://www.rome2015.it/call-for-abstracts/)

The Conference is hosted by FAO - Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. FAO will provide its expertise to ensure that the Conference findings –which are sole responsibility of the organizers—are relevant to member countries goals of food security, sustainable natural resources management and rural development. The Conference will be held on November 19-20, 2015 at FAO Headquarters (Rome).

The Conference aims to involve scientists, researchers and policy makers to provide a focused summary of the key impacts of climate and climate change on natural and socio-economic environments, and highlight needed response actions and related policies on adaptation and mitigation activities, ahead of the UNFCCC Conference of Parties in Paris, COP21, on Dec 2015.

The main objectives of the Conference will be to summarize the Italian experience on climate research and policy action, within the international setting, and specifically:

- Highlight the most relevant results achieved by the scientific community in the field of climate research and policy;
- Provide the scientific knowledge in support of evidence-based decision making in preparation of needed adaptation and mitigation strategies, with explicit linkages to food security and sustainable development goals of developing countries;
- Explore future perspectives for research needs on climate change;
- Provide a fruitful opportunity for dialogue, exchange of ideas and sharing of experiences within the scientific community towards policy-relevant knowledge.

A statement from the Italian scientific community will be proposed during the Symposium in order to be presented at the XXI UNFCCC- Conference of the Parties in Paris.

MAIN THEMES

THE PHYSICS OF CLIMATE CHANGE
This session aims to summarize the latest knowledge synthesized by the IPCC AR5, and explore specifically key emerging issues, with an emphasis on changes in climate variability. This session invites studies focusing on: (1) advances in understanding physical and dynamical processes of climate phenomena; (2) climate model improvements to investigate climate drivers, variability, and extreme events and quantify model biases and uncertainties; (3) new approaches to explore extreme events in the recent past and projected future and to study linkages with large-scale circulation patterns.

OCEAN AND CLIMATE CHANGE ON THE WAY TO COP21
This session will examine the state of the ocean and its interaction with different components of the Climate system (e.g. air-sea/ice-ocean/land-atmosphere interactions), with the aim to explore ocean trends and changes, due to climate and anthropogenic pressure, and their impact on service and resources for society. This session invites studies exploring new advances in: (1) better understanding of marine physical-biological interactions and identification of poorly represented processes; (2) data assimilation and forecasting at global and regional scale; (3) assessing global and Mediterranean Sea oceanic changes and evaluating their impacts on the coastal systems through numerical models and observations; (4) understanding the main processes that drive the ocean internal variability, the transferring mechanism of the momentum, heat and mass between marginal sea and open ocean including inter-sub-basins exchange; (5) the evolution in the understanding of the marine ecosystem functioning and the technological developments that allowed to improve our knowledge on the mechanisms regulating the climate variability.

WATER, ENERGY AND FOOD NEXUS IN AGRICULTURE
Climate change and variability will alter the frequency of extreme events, including heat waves, dry spells and precipitation events that have significant impact on food, energy and water supply. Bioenergy and food increasingly compete for scarce land and water resources, so that a food, water and energy nexus perspective is crucial towards understanding the agriculture sector. This session will focus on: (1) methodologies and applications using direct (and proximal) data, geo-spatial, and remote sensing data to monitor crop distribution and growth, water resources, in order to improve early warning systems to be used for climate variability risk reduction and climate change adaptation needs; (2) Impacts of climate change, especially projected increases of extreme events on agriculture, water resources, and food security; (3) bridging the economic and energy demands with food and water quantity and quality. Studies focusing on these issues within the Mediterranean Basin are particularly welcome.

CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE FUTURE OF LAND SYSTEM AND BIODIVERSITY
Climate change is expected to affect the frequency and severity of extreme meteorological, hydrological and geo-hydrological events in coming decades. Large urban centers and coastal areas may be particularly affected in the next decades, in conjunction with current socio-economic trends. Climate change will also impact negatively living communities, especially considering the speed of the change projected, which raises serious concerns for species survival and biodiversity preservation in terrestrial, freshwater and marine environments. It is thought that under climate change 20-30% of plant and animal species will be at an increased risk of extinction. Contributions to this session are expected to address the understanding and estimation of how climate change, together with other changes, is affecting or will affect the land system and the biodiversity, with a specific focus on increased frequency of extreme events. This session invites studies focusing on the risk to the land system and biodiversity related to increased frequency of climatic hazards (such as rain- and wind-storms, hail, river and coastal flooding, erosion, landslides but also fire, droughts and heat-waves). Application of ecosystem approaches are encouraged, including linkages between relevant biophysical and socio-economic components.

CLIMATE CHANGE RESPONSE ACTIONS
This session focuses on adaptation and mitigation options needed to ensure sustainable development across spatial and temporal scales. It aims to highlight opportunities for: reducing the risks posed by climate change on natural and human systems; increasing urban resilience and protecting ecosystem services at local and regional level; elaborating proposals for climate change action within the post-2015 development agenda. AR5 describes the main risks, and a lot of job has to be done yet in order to understand how operate in the different places and situations. It seems that the scale concept would be critical towards mitigation and adaptation actions. Session topics will include the analysis of 1) adaptation and mitigation studies through the different scales of the natural events and the governance processes, 2) limitations and knowledge gaps, and 3) critical issues in local (urban) and regional planning through examples and case studies. Research using both top-down and bottom-up approaches are welcome. The aim of this call is ultimately that of identifying pathways for the integration between the scientific applied knowledge and the best practices at any level of governance.

COP21, THE INDCs AND POLICIES TO ADRESS CLIMATE CHANGE
The next 2015 Paris Climate Conference is expected to deliver a broad agreement to keep GHG emissions under control in order to stay within the 2°C global warming target. In preparation, developed and developing countries are currently submitting their national post-2020 climate action/ambitions, known as Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs). However, whatever the outcome of COP 21, what really matters is the set of policies that each country will implement after Paris to achieve the final settled goal. What is the role of Europe in this context? What national and international policies will be supported and implemented by Italy? What contributions will the public and private sector give to reduce GHG emissions? What are the prospects for the EU-ETS? Given that climate change is already, at least partly, unavoidable, what measures is Europe and Italy going to implement to adapt to the upcoming climate change and how these interact with mitigation? What sectors are most vulnerable and need rapid interventions? What is the role of the insurance sector? Where do financial resources come from? Preparing to COP21, this session addresses these and other questions to highlight pros and cons of policy-induced low carbon technological transitions and societal transformations, options for autonomous and planned adaptation, plans and incentives to redirect investments towards climate-friendly business opportunities.

HOW TO PRESENT YOUR WORK
A short abstract (maximum 300 words) should be submitted online in its final version, in English, no later than September 20, 2015.

Authors are requested to follow the instructions and the format downloadable from the Template webpage (http://www.rome2015.it/templates/), and to choose the type of presentation (oral presentation or poster).

A notification of the acceptance of your work will be communicated to you by October 15, 2015.
All work will be evaluated by the Scientific Committee.

SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE
You can find a list of the Scientific Committee’s members at this webpage: http://www.rome2015.it/about-the-conference/scientific-committee/

IMPORTANT DATES
September 30, 2015: extended deadline for submission of short abstracts
October 15, 2015: notification of acceptance
November 3, 2015: deadline for online registration

MORE INFORMATION
For more information contact the Scientific Secretary at scientific@rome2015.it