Regional Activities and Capacity Building Regional activities
are important to ESSP's mandate on several levels. Current
knowledge demonstrates that, at the regional level, aspects of
global environmental change manifest significantly different -
yet surprisingly coherent and teleconnected - Earth System
dynamics. These are often broadly associated with socio-economic
and geopolitical characteristics. The ESSP is currently
developing a small set of Integrated Regional Studies (IRS),
designed to contribute sound scientific understanding in support
of sustainable development at the local level. These studies
will also improve overall knowledge of regional-global linkages
in the context of Earth System dynamics. The first such study is
in Monsoon Asia (MAIRS). ESSP regional activities also seek to
directly address the differences in scientific capabilities in
various regions of the world. Each of the four global
environmental change programmes organises research activities
and capacity-building initiatives, and