On August 23rd, the ANSO Silk Road Forum and the Third Meeting of the Second ATES Scientific Conference opened at Lanzhou University. With the theme of "Evolution of Silk Road Civilization and Climate and Environmental Changes", this conference is also one of the activities of International Basic Science for Sustainable Development (IYBSSD) of Chinese Academy of Sciences, and more than 200 experts and scholars from China, Germany, Russia, Iran, the United Kingdom, the United States, Spain, and Mongolia participated in the conference and exchanged interdisciplinary research results. The conference was organized by the Alliance of International Science Organizations for the Belt and Road (ANSO), the Alliance of Transcontinental Exchanges and Silk Road Civilizations (ATES), the UNESCO Representative Office in China, the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA), and co-sponsored by Lanzhou University, Dunhuang Academy, and the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Studies of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
The Congress was co-chaired by Academician Bai Chunli, President of ANSO, Academician Chen Fahu, Director of the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Studies of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and President of ATES, Jürg Luterbacher, Chief Scientist of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), and Michael Meadows, President of the International Geographical Union (IGU). Yan Chunhua, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and president of Lanzhou University, Liu Weidong, director of the International Cooperation Bureau of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Zhang Guoyou, secretary-general of the Chinese Geographical Society, Ferenc Hudecz, vice-president of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and Shahbaz Khan, director of the Representative Office of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in China participated in the meeting both on and offline, and delivered speeches.
Bai Chunli pointed out that the Silk Road has been a road of openness, integration and peace since ancient times, and in view of a series of problems currently facing the world, the scientific community should adhere to the spirit of the Silk Road, strengthen international scientific and technological cooperation and promote humanistic exchanges with the spirit of openness and integration, so as to jointly deal with the major challenges facing the sustainable development of the world at present.
Jürg Luterbacher said that climate change and extreme disaster events, etc. are increasingly affecting our lives and the security of the global community, and that the World Meteorological Organization and other United Nations agencies expect to enhance the prediction and early-warning capability of extreme events and improve the adaptive capacity of the global community to climate change by strengthening science and technology with various countries.
Chen Fahu said that the Silk Road civilization, which has prospered for thousands of years, is the crystallization of the convergence and fusion of Eastern and Western civilizations, and a model of human adaptation to changes in the climate environment and efforts to create regional peace and development. The establishment and development of the ATES international cooperation platform will further enhance interdisciplinary, cross-regional and cross-linguistic scientific research cooperation and exchanges, and continue to promote sustainable and high-quality development along the Silk Road.
The conference will last for three days. The conference organized six thematic sessions focusing on environmental change and sustainable development along the Silk Road, Paleolithic culture and human dispersion, early transcontinental exchanges in agriculture and animal husbandry, Silk Road passage and town changes, scientific and technological exchanges along the Silk Road, and genetic history of Silk Road populations.
During the conference, the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Studies of the Chinese Academy of Sciences reached an agreement with the University of Tehran, Iran, to build a joint archaeological research center and a center for West Asia in Tehran, to explore the diffusion and evolutionary patterns of ancient Persian civilization along the Silk Road, as well as the connection between Persian and Chinese civilizations. At the same time, ATES Union reached a cooperation agreement with Loránd University of Hungary on jointly carrying out cooperative research on the evolution of civilizations along the Silk Road, and promoting activities such as exchange of scholars' visits, co-organization of academic conferences, exhibitions and publications. In addition, the delegates visited the branch laboratories of Chronology, Environmental Archaeology, Tree Rotation and Biogeochemistry of the Key Laboratory of Western China's Environmental Systems, Ministry of Education.
ANSO, as an international scientific and technological organization established by the Chinese Academy of Sciences under the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative, aims to promote the high-quality development of the Belt and Road for the benefit of the people of the countries along the routes, and to promote the building of a community of human destiny. With the support of ANSO, Academician Chen Fahu led the initiation of the ATES Consortium in 2019 to deepen the understanding of the interactions between climate and environmental change, transcontinental long-term exchanges, and the evolution of Silk Road civilizations through interdisciplinary research.
Lanzhou has been an important transportation hub of the Silk Road since ancient times. Lanzhou University attaches great importance to international cooperation along the Silk Road, and has taken the lead in organizing the "One Belt, One Road" University Consortium, with 184 universities joining at home and abroad, covering 27 countries and regions on five continents, and forming a large international influence.
Earth science is an advantageous discipline of Lanzhou University, with geography, atmospheric science, geology, ecology, environmental archaeology and other sub-disciplines, and has trained a large number of internationally renowned top scientists, such as Li Jijun, Qin Dahe, Yao Tandong, and Chen Fahu, etc. Lanzhou University's geology research group has long been committed to research on climate and environmental changes in arid zones, civilization evolution, human-earth relations, ecological security, geological disasters, sustainable development and other aspects. In recent years, the research footprint of Lanzhou University has expanded to Central Asia, South Asia, West Asia, Africa, Europe and other regions along the Silk Road, especially in the arid climate change and the evolution of Silk Road civilization, with international scholars to carry out in-depth cooperation, has achieved a number of promising research results. The convening of this meeting will promote the scholars' understanding of cutting-edge scientific issues, and further deepen the cooperation between Lanzhou University and all parties in scientific research, talent training, social services and other aspects.
At 12:00 a.m. on August 25, the conference came to a successful end. More than 100 experts and scholars from universities and research institutes from 19 countries, as well as teachers and students concerned about the Silk Road, attended the closing ceremony. The closing ceremony was presided over by Hou Juzhi, a researcher of the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Studies, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Wang Mi, Xiang Lixiong, Ikram Quyum and Jieming Chou won the best poster presentation award.
