Prof. Adrian Pfiffner from the University of Bern explored the processes of bedrock in general and of the area around Flims in particular. About 8400 years ago the Flims rockslide, which is considered to be the biggest rockslide to have happened in the Alps, occurred. The trigger of the event is not entirely clear: The rockslide may have been caused by heavy rainfalls or by an earthquake. 9 km3 of rock barricaded the valley and dammed up the Vorderrhein at Ilanz/Glion. Eventually the water cut a curb into the dam and gushed into the Churer Rheintal. The event had an impact as far as Lake Constance.

In his first presentation A. Zehnder posed the question whether water would become a key driver for globalization. His conclusions can be summarized as follows:

• Water will become an economic driver thus accentuating economical and political dependencies.
• Many countries, especially the developing countries, will not be able to produce the food they need because of a lack of water. In order to be able to satisfy their requirements on the world market they must gain economic prosperity.
• The water infrastructure will be an economic challenge also for industrialized countries.
• Escalating water conflicts can be avoided only by global solidarity among industrialized countries and new distribution approaches.
• In this regard the conservation of vital ecosystems is particularly important.

Global change, such as population growth, land degradation and climate change, has a much greater impact on developing countries than on Switzerland and other developed countries. In poor countries even small changes may lead to existential difficulties.

Prof. Hans Hurni, director of the National Competence Center for Research «North-South» discussed the challenges regarding water supply. He showed that, within a watershed, water usage and pollution up-streams may cause serious conflicts with down-stream communities. While this is presently of no concern for Switzerland we may face similar water distribution and pollution challenges in the coming decades.

Hurni points out several needs for action:

• enhanced cooperation between countries within the same watershed
• long term adaptation strategies
• more efficient water usage

Additional actions for Switzerland:

• stronger focus of the international cooperation on global change issues and adaptation measures in contrast to instant problem solving

Health is another critical topic which particularly affects developing countries. Prof. Marcel Tanner, director of the Swiss Tropical Institute in Basel, shows, that development is tightly linked to health. Global change puts additional pressure on the health problem. Of special concern from a health point of view are climate change, population dynamics and -structure, migration, urbanization, fresh- and waste water, and changes in land use. As many of these issues are interconnected, the societal, health and ecological aspects should be tackled together. Both speakers stressed the importance of research partnerships as a stable means to transfer knowledge and technology.

The key messages in brief: About half of the anthropogenic CO2 emissions remain in the atmosphere resulting in a CO2 increase of one percent every two years. Plants store about the same amount of CO2 as is stored in the Atmosphere, 90% of which is stored in the forest. Global forestation projects can delay CO2 increase by maximally 5 years. To store the Swiss emissions the whole forestable space in Switzerland would be forested in 13 years. The CO2 storage capacity of fast growing plants is smaller than that of old forest. Plant growth rate has nothing to do with Carbon stock in plants. The greenhouse gas problem can thus not be solved in this matter, but an efficient usage of wood is an important step forward. Wood and wood processing is environmentally sound, sustainable and generates labor in Switzerland.