INNOVATE

INNOVATE is one of the 12 collaborative research projects funded under the Sustainable Land Management measure by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). The GLUES coordination project integrates the 12 regional projects on a global scale.

The Itaparica reservoir, built in the 1980ies, dams up the São Francisco River in the semi-arid hinterland of Northeastern Brazil. About 40,000 people were dislocated. They could choose between compensation payments for moving out or resettlement in newly established smallholder irrigation schemes. Some of the irrigation lands suffer from poor soils and insufficient drainage systems. The recently formed Brazilian-German research project INNOVATE addresses these shortcomings and prospective opportunities by an inter- and transdisciplinary approach. The practiced aquatic and terrestrial production systems and respective ecosystem functions and services will be assessed. Tests include potential innovations such as modified fishery systems, sediment re-use, biochar as soil amendment, adjusting crop rotations and integrating production sectors. Biodiversity patterns will be assessed and the impacts of production-system changes modelled. Global climate scenarios will be down-scaled and small-scale results of nutrient and hydrodynamics and the impact of land use change up-scaled to the catchment level. Socio-economic consequences will be assessed and impacts of global change and improved farming practices valued economically on a regional level. Finally, a qualitative decision support approach, applying constellation analysis, will adress the interactions of good practice and governance in sustainable reservoir and watershed management. A stakeholder round table, right from the project's start, institutionalizes and prepares the results' implementation process. All research modules are staffed bi-nationally. The collaborative project belongs to a framework of 12 large regional projects, which integrates the results of regional sustainable land management on a global scale.