ECOBOOM project proposes an analysis of the contemporary transformations of the mining sector in the energy transition, and its effects on the modes of exploitation and the territories. It takes a North/South perspective, extending from extractive territories to national and global scales. It compares two parallel but connected extractive processes in the global mining arena, and investigates their connections: the energy transition metals (ETMs) boom, which concerns metals such as lithium and rare earths, and artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) supply chain, which particularly affects the gold sector. This collective research is based on the central hypothesis of the ecologization of the resources, understood both as a new rhetoric aimed at making the exploitation of certain minerals 'indispensable', and as the set of institutional and technical mechanisms linked to it. This comparison between supply chains and resources aims to take into account the complex articulation between spatial scales, temporalities and levels of socio-political organization, for which a common analytical framework is mobilized. The notion of 'moral economy' allows to take into account the production, circulation and use of moral sentiments, values, norms and obligations in the global social space, which are superimposed on the traditional political economy. The notion of 'governable spaces' focuses on the impacts of these changes, both in the global mining arena and on territories. This comparative perspective places the study of the energy transition within the more systemic process of the 'great transition' in terms of North/South environmental, social and global justice. This approach responds to the issues of the "Societies and territories in transition" axis by questioning spatial transitions, identities and territorial sovereignties, the relationships between societies and territories around resource management, and the recomposition of relations between centers and peripheries introduced by the new extractive booms. The project focuses on three research axes: 1) the discourses and devices of the rhetoric of ecologization of the resources, perceived as a new global moral economy that we confront with the moral economies of the extractive sites of ETMs and ASM (gold); 2) the implementation of this ecologization in mining territories through a more localized bottom-up approach to governable spaces, which indicates both the reorganization of material flows specific to each resource and their infrastructures, and the recomposition of forms of politicization, in terms of social and environmental justice; 3) a comparative approach between supply chains aimed at determining the driving forces that orient their respective trajectories. This analysis of discursive and material circulations aims to consider the effects of decoupling between 'green' and 'dirty' supply chains, in a context of competition between extractive territories. The comparative case studies have been selected in the North and South for their complementarity, the expertise of the project members and the new orientations of national policies towards the extraction of ETMs. The main fields are France, where a collective fieldwork will be conducted to strengthen the comparison, New Caledonia, Bolivia and Ivory Coast. They will be complemented by secondary fields (Arizona, Venezuela, Senegal, Sudan) which have been selected to serve as counterpoints to the main fields or to shed light on decoupling effects. In each field, workshops will be held with the resident populations in order to exchange views on the energy transition and to carry out joint reflections towards a fair and equitable 'great transition'.

The United Nations’ (UN) Sustainable Development Goal 14 – Life below water – aims at conserving and sustainably using the oceans, which represent 70% of the Earth’s surface. This goal is connected to the global target to expand protected areas to 30% of the planet by 2030, focusing on areas that are particularly important for biodiversity, such as coral reefs, on which people living in coastal areas depend to survive. This is particularly the case for New Caledonia and Fiji – two archipelagos that are located in the Pacific Ocean – where most of the population lives in coastal areas and relies on some of the largest barrier reefs in the world. Pacific Island countries and territories – in particular their Indigenous peoples who see themselves as the custodians of the ocean for the general good, their sovereign rights, and their holistic knowledge – are increasingly recognized as integral for achieving such ambitious conservation objectives. The reef passages connecting coastal waters and the open ocean are known as outstanding hotspots of biodiversity and productivity. Hence, they are of multifaceted significance for the overall health of coral reef ecosystems. SOCPacific2R explores these social-ecological ‘keystone places’ and ‘communication zones’ that have hardly been investigated by natural and social sciences. Through its empirical focus on New Caledonia and Fiji, and based on a trusted and interdisciplinary French-German-Pacific partnership, the project aims at: 1. Conducting a transdisciplinary study of reef passages as under-researched features of social-ecological coral reef systems that constitute complex, interconnected, and dynamic assemblages of living and non-living, dwelling and transiting, entities that interact with each other; 2. Documenting both area-based and other management and conservation arrangements applied to reef passages, including pros and cons that local stakeholder groups identify; 3. Establishing a participatory science-society-policy dialogue informed by social-ecological studies, Oceanian socio-cosmologies and sovereignties, and governance norms in/for the management and conservation of reef passages. Through these interrelated objectives and associated capacity-building components, SOCPacific2R will both embrace and feed the vision of the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030) and will facilitate the integration of reef passages in future marine/ocean policy and practice. It will provide holders of customary rights, policy-makers and other stakeholders with evidence-based research and exchange fora to empower them for the joint management and conservation of reef passages. Therefore, this project will integrate both a conventional and a more-than-human approach to ethnography into interdisciplinary dialogues, while using methods and dialogic spaces to more directly and actively engage various stakeholder groups throughout the research process.

Transported by currents, plastics strand on the coastal areas, important places of artisanal fisheries. Plastics can harbor pathogens that are involved in human epidemics. It is thus legitimate to ask whether these pathogens and their virulence & resistance genes (PVR) can be transferred to marine animals that ingest plastics, and potentially to human who consumes them. Plastics would thus play a role of vector. VectoPlastic implements a multidisciplinary approach to evaluate this role in a socio-ecosystem dependent on artisanal fisheries (Tule´ar, Madagascar). The objectives are to evaluate the transfer of PRV to 2 commercial species, their persistence from capture to sale on stalls, the perception of populations of the health risk related to plastics and their pathogens, and an integrated risk assessment; in order to define sensitization and management actions adapted to the socio-cultural context.

Q4M brings together scientific partners and societal stakeholders from five Mediterranean countries to advance climate-resilient quinoa crops and upscale their cultivation and valorization in an integrated approach. Guided by national priorities, reinforced by a multi-actor network and implementing the ‘living lab concept’, we will demonstrate the power and benefits of agroecological quinoa farming at 12 distinct multi-agroecosystem demo sites with various crop combinations, under varying agronomic regimes, facing diverse climate and soil conditions. Based on ‘lessons learned’ from previous projects, and teaming up with complementary initiatives, we will select and stably integrate best-adapted multi-purpose quinoa lines in multiple farming environments and valorization chains. Together with societal and company partners we strive to invigorate local value chains/ nets and a stable market for quinoa producers. Introduction of novel quinoa breeding lines will diversify current cropping systems, stabilize overall harvests, recover soils, and improve year-round crop production for food/ income security of smallholders. Three main objectives have been defined: 1. Breed/ establish multi-purpose quinoa varieties better adapted to saline, marginal Mediterranean soils, resilient to climate change, reducing post-harvest processing, and enriching crop diversity for sustainable agricultural management. 2. Establish zero waste quinoa valorization chains delivering affordable gluten-free foods for people suffering from gluten adverse effects, and other non-food products (feed, biochar, cosmetics). 3. Provide guidance, support and a networking platform for stakeholders. Q4M’s work program has at its core the Living Labs (WP7), which receive input and provide feedback to scientific Work Packages (WP1-5). A multi-stakeholder setup and regular feedback loops will allow speedy optimization of crops, methods and agricultural systems at sites. Our project takes the whole system into account by enabling successful, widespread adoption of agroecological quinoa farming and marketing its products. WP1 will develop climate-resilient quinoa crop with key traits for cultivation (tolerance to salinity, drought, heat) and processing (saponin content, nutritional composition). Selected quinoa accessions are tested in agroecological farming settings using environmentally friendly techniques to manage weeds, diseases and pests, minimize tillage and maintain continuous land cover to reduce soil erosion, improve soil fertility and microbiological status. Carbon sequestration in the soil through crop rotations, intercropping, cover crops/green manure, biochar and compost use will be addressed (WP2). To optimize quinoa valorization, key traits such as germination, nutritional characteristics, reduced saponins and other desired traits will be assessed and resulting products developed in local value chains/nets (WP3). The adoption of the quinoa farming system is to benefit smallholder farmers, increase income and empower women and the youth, advancing social innovation (WP4). Q4M’s Living Labs putting our scientific results into practice. Their success, environmental effects, sustainability and cost-benefit relation will be evaluated (WP5). WP6 will disseminate results, enabling roll-outs and spin-offs with tailored communication and intensive networking. With an ambitious, achievable work program, Q4M contributes to knowledge-based upscaling of agroecological field practices, as well as resilience and prosperity of smallholder systems in marginal Mediterranean settings while protecting biodiversity. Q4M takes up priorities of UN Agenda 2030 (SDGs), EU policies and National Strategies or Action Plans of Maghreb countries, and thus will have positive impact on future agricultural policies. We establish the groundwork and connect partners for subsequent projects, follow-up on adapting small farming systems to climate change and improving health and livelihoods.

Conflicts between humans and large marine predators are increasing around the world, often resulting in excess mortality of animals without satisfactory results in terms of effectiveness (to reduce risk) and respect for conservation issues (regarding threatened species). The risk management response in aquatic environments often consists of non-selective removal of animals, such as for sharks after human fatalities, based on the assumption that the risk is correlated with their density. In our study, we propose to test an alternative hypothesis based on the existence of problem individuals (PIs) -demonstrated in terrestrial environments- in two species (a toothed cetacean and a shark) in which parental guidance diverges significantly. This hypothesis of PIs is based on the existence of divergent temperaments and personality traits such as boldness-shyness (management of novelty) and risk-taking-avoidance (management of danger) which would be transmitted from one generation to another. With an ethological approach, the existence of these behavioural traits will be tested on killer whales in Antarctica and on two behaviours: i) the hunting technique of voluntary stranding on beaches to predate elephant seal juveniles and ii) the depredation of hooked fish in the context of commercial longline fisheries. In parallel, two populations of bull sharks will be studied in Fiji in the framework of observation dives based on artificial feeding; the behaviours studied will be i) the attitude towards artificial food (novelty), ii) towards divers (danger) and between conspecifics (sociability and agressiveness). The observations will take place over two years in order to be able to i) discriminate individual divergent behaviours (Work package - WP1) and show ii) that they are consistant in time and iii) according to various situations (WP2). This fieldwork will be accompanied by DNA sampling of monitored animals. WP3 will consist in demonstrating the heritability of personalities between generations in the bull shark (RAdseq analyses on n=60 individuals) and in killer whales (pedigree with n=30 individuals); we will also try to explore the molecular mechanisms on which this heritability could rely. WP4 will synthesize the results concerning the genesis of PIs (influence of genetics vs learning processes) within the two taxa and will conduct a socio-anthropological study on the perception by the various stakeholders of the human-large marine predator conflicts. These approaches should allow us to better understand the evolutional and survival issues for both taxa (fundamental science), but also to address societal issues (applied science), in terms of proposing improved risk and conservation management. The research consortium will be composed of four institutional partners, namely CRIOBE (EPHE-CNRS), CEBC (CNRS-ULR), MARBEC (IRD) and SENS (IRD), providing three research directors, three research fellows and two PhD students (not funded by ANR - sex-ratio F 33%) directly involved in the WPs. The project will be co-coordinated by two of the senior researchers with solid experience in managing international scientific projects. They will be supported by an external monitoring committee composed of four senior researchers with international expertise in shark ecology (Univ. of Hawaii), vertebrate ethology (Univ. Quebec in Montreal), genetics (CRIOBE) and human-wildlife conflict management (Norwegian Institute for Nature Research). The project plans to recruit two PhD students to work respectively on the collection of ethological data on killer whales in Antarctica and sharks in Fiji, an 18-month post-doc to support the genetic component and five Master2 students. A grant of 750 k€ is requested, 46% of which is allocated to the recruitment of students, 33% to the collection of data in Antarctica and Fiji and the rest (9% excluding management fees) essentially for genetic analyses, anthropological study, communication and publication costs.