OU Geography sponsors Hugging the Coast

The OpenSpace Research Centre is proud to announce that The Open University's Department of Geography has contributed funds towards the cost of the Hugging the Coast project.

Hugging the Coast is a research expedition that was awarded the 2012 RGS-IBG Neville Shulman Challenge Award. Led by OpenSpace affiliate member Dr Johanna Wadsley and Dr Duika Burges Watson of Durham University, the team is formed of 6 women who will paddle the 320km-length volcanic Sangihe Archipelago, North Sulawesi, Indonesia during August 2012. The team will visit island communities at the centre of the Coral Triangle - from Manado to Pulau Sangihe - to meet women who farm seaweed. The seaweed grown in North Sulawesi is a vital source of income to these communities (and a significant regional development strategy), but it is also an increasingly important 'climate smart' agricultural product across the Coral Triangle: most of the seaweed currently ends up as an invisible ingredient in Western processed food, but its potential role in carbon sequestration, in tree-less paper production, and as a biofuel, makes Indonesian seaweed a globally significant product in climate change adaptation.

You too can support and follow this fantastic expedition by visiting the Hugging the Coast project website.

The OpenSpace Research Centre will host a seminar by Johanna Wadsley and Duika Burges Watson on 7 November 2012. Material generated through Hugging the Coast will contribute to the Open University's Creative Climate, a 10-year environmental change diary project, and DTS06, a new Open University Environment module currently in production.