Earth System Science Partnership (ESSP)

The Earth System Science Partnership is a partnership of four international global change research programmes (DIVERSITAS, IGBP, International Human Dimensions Programme (IHDP) and the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) for the integrated study of the Earth System, the changes that are occurring to the system and the implications of these changes for global sustainability. The partnership is undergoing major restructuring as the four programmes transform into the new Future Earth initiative.

The central activities of the ESSP are projects on issues of global sustainability, designed to address the global change aspects of a four critical issues for human well-being: energy and carbon cycles, food systems, water resources and human health. Capacity building is also a central part of the ESSP activities.

Group on Earth Observations

IGBP has strong links to the global observations community (e.g. the Group on Earth Observations — GEO; the Integrated Global Observing Strategy — IGOS; the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites - CEOS). Representatives of these groups often attend IGBP scientific committee meetings.

Scientific Committee for Oceanic Research (SCOR)

SCOR  is co-sponsor of the GLOBEC (now complete), IMBER and SOLAS projects

Commission on Atmospheric Chemistry and Global Pollution (CACGP)

CACGP co-sponsors SOLAS and IGAC.

European Space Agency (ESA)

ESA employs a liaison to work closely with IGBP projects.

US Global Change Research Program and NASA

Since its inception, IGBP has had close ties with these US organizations.

International Assessments

IGBP contributes to global assessments such at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA).

Regional Networks

IGBP also works closely with the Asia-Pacific Network for Global Change Research (APN), and the Inter American Institute for Global Change Research (IAI).

Both APN and IAI support IGBP-related research and training activities, and are important partners in developing scientific agendas appropriate for their respective regions.

These collaborations are very important for IGBP, because these organizations provide significant scientific input and guidance to the projects as well as co-sponsoring the Fast-Track Initiatives.