The IDS-coordinated STEPS Centre is taking part in a variety of activities at the Planet Under Pressure conference in London this week (26-29 March).

As well as convening a key session, the STEPS Centre will have a stand in the exhibition space and will also launch their Pathways to Sustainability book series at an evening drinks reception.

Key session: Pathways to Sustainability

IDS Research Fellow and STEPS Centre director Melissa Leach will chair a key session entitled Pathways to Sustainability: opening up diverse technological futures in the green economy at 10.30am on Tuesday 27 March. Convened by Adrian Ely (STEPS Centre), Lawrence Gudza (Practical Action, Southern Africa) and Dinesh Abrol (National Institute for Science, Technology and Development Studies, India), the session brings together researchers and practitioners from around the world who have been trying to open up diverse technological pathways to sustainability and to enable more inclusive governance of their directions. Participants will reflect on a number of case studies from North and South and discuss their implications for the future of the green economy. Read more about the issues to be discussed in an article by Adrian Ely on the Planet Under Pressure blog.

Presentations in other sessions

STEPS Centre researcher Adrian Ely will present in a session entitled Governance of Emerging Technologies in the Context of Sustainable Development, at 4pm on Wednesday 28 March. Chaired by Claudia Neubauer and Brian Wynne, the session will look at rapidly emerging areas of research such as synthetic biology, geoengineering and nanotechnology and discuss how these potentially transforming technologies can be evaluated for their safety, ethics and societal or environmental impacts.

IDS Fellow Alan Nicol will present recent experience from the Nile Basin in the session Collective governance of shared resources: examples of sustainable approaches for complex multi-scale 'commons' at 4pm on Wednesday 28 March in room 14.

Adrian Ely will be taking part in a panel discussion on Global environmental change and sustainable development in least developed countries session at 4pm on Monday 26 March in the ICC Auditorium.

On Thursday, Adrian Ely will be on a panel discussing Research and policy for sustainable consumption: what is needed? at 3pm in room 12.

Pathways to Sustainabilty book series launch

There will be a drinks reception at 5.30pm on Tuesday 27 March, to celebrate the launch of the STEPS Centre Pathways to Sustainability book series where Melissa Leach, STEPS Centre director, and Johan Rockström, Stockholm Resilience Centre executive director, will say a few words. The reception will take place in the relaxed setting of the Connaught Room at the Ramada Docklands Hotel (next to the Excel conference centre) to allow delegates the chance to socialise after a busy schedule.

Exhibition space

The STEPS Centre will have a stand in the exhibition area where you can claim a 20 per cent delegate discount on STEPS books, record an interview on your hopes for Rio+20 and pick up free CDs of Innovation, Sustainability, Development: A New Manifesto and STEPS Centre films, Water and Justice and Seeds and Sustainability.

We'll be asking people at Planet Under Pressure and other events to tell us what sustainable development issue they want to see addressed at the Rio+20 Earth Summit in June. If you are at the event, you can record your response at our stand in the exhibitor area. Here are a selection of the responses.

For more details about STEPS Centre activities at Planet Under Pressure, see the STEPS Centre website.