USP and INRAE launch international research center for planetary health
Based in Piracicaba, the center hosted an event that brought together Brazilian and French researchers to mark the launch of the new research and innovation ecosystem
Brazilian and French researchers discussed the strategic areas of the new center – Photo: Gerhard Waller
The announcement is part of Esalq’s 125th anniversary celebrations, and the new transdisciplinary center will bring together USP’s ecosystem of scientific excellence—with the Piracicaba campus playing a leading role—and the expertise of the French institution.
Esalq director Thais Vieira emphasized that PHIRC represents a new way of generating knowledge: integrated, interdisciplinary, and international. “Food and nutrition security, the resilience of agrifood systems, climate change, and the health of people and the planet can no longer be addressed by institutions or countries working in isolation. They require collaborative networks capable of integrating expertise, disciplines, and different realities. It is in this context that USP reaffirms its commitment to internationalization and to the generation of knowledge on a global scale”, said the director.
Thais Vieira (Esalq director), Gerardo Ruiz Blanco (French Ministry of Agriculture), Aluísio Segurado (USP President), and Philippe Mauguin (INRAE President) – Photo: Gerhard Waller
USP President Aluísio Segurado attended the ceremony launching the new center alongside the researchers – Photo: Gerhard Waller
A powerful scientific partnership
The center begins its activities by bringing together a network of more than 200 researchers. This international collaboration will create synergies by combining the study of tropical and temperate ecosystems to develop solutions that neither country could achieve independently.
To officially mark the beginning of the partnership, some of the participating researchers from Brazil and France met on July 6, 7, and 8 in São Paulo, Pirassununga, and Piracicaba.
The event marked the beginning of the new center’s management activities and presented the perspectives for its five core pillars:
- Sustainable production systems (crop and livestock production);
- Climate change adaptation and mitigation in agriculture, forests, and the food sector;
- Responsible resource use for healthy environments (with a focus on water and soil management);
- Healthy food systems and preventive nutrition (research on alternative proteins and the reuse of agro-industrial waste);
- Digital agriculture and food systems (the use of artificial intelligence, automation, and smart sensors).
The program began on July 6 with an institutional meeting at the headquarters of the São Paulo Research Foundation (Fapesp) in São Paulo. The delegation then traveled to USP’s Pirassununga campus, where the official opening of the INRAE office at the School of Animal Science and Food Engineering (FZEA) took place, with the participation of FZEA director Carmen Silvia Favaro Trindade and researchers affiliated with the center.
The delegation visited USP’s Pirassununga campus, where the official opening of the INRAE office at the School of Animal Science and Food Engineering (FZEA) took place, with the participation of FZEA director Carmen Silvia Favaro Trindade and researchers affiliated with the center – Photo: Welson Barbosa
On July 7, Brazilian and French researchers convened the event’s scientific and deliberative core at the Central Building of Esalq, in Piracicaba. The event was attended by USP President Aluísio Segurado, who emphasized that this ecosystem operates at the forefront of one of the world’s greatest contemporary challenges: “The International Research Center for Planetary Health seeks to address one of the most important challenges of the modern world, namely food production and its consequences for a sustainable and healthy world.”
According to Segurado, partnerships of this nature help USP fulfill its mission of advancing research, science, and innovation. “USP is Latin America’s leading university in the generation of innovative knowledge, and international academic partnerships strengthen the fulfillment of that mission. We are talking here about a particularly special partnership, involving not only Esalq but also other USP schools and institutes, as well as France’s leading agricultural research institution, INRAE. It is therefore an initiative of remarkable strength in terms of its conception and the robustness of its proposal, one that will undoubtedly contribute to educating people, generating innovative knowledge, and translating it into benefits for society while securing funding from national and international research funding agencies”, said the president.
The official inauguration of the INRAE office at Esalq also took place in Piracicaba. During the program, representatives of USP and the French institute presented the scientific research programs associated with PHIRC’s five core pillars and held the inaugural meeting of the Board of Directors, during which the management plan, funding opportunities, and the scientific action plan for the next 12 months were discussed. This was followed by a session of discussions and recommendations by the External Advisory Board.
According to Segurado, partnerships of this nature help USP fulfill its mission of advancing research, science, and innovation – Photo: Gerhard Waller
A rich academic partnership
According to INRAE President Philippe Mauguin, the establishment of PHIRC represents the continuation of a rich scientific partnership between the two countries. “This is excellent news because we already have extensive collaborations with our Brazilian colleagues in areas such as climate, agriculture, food, and biodiversity. We are working to find solutions that will enable agriculture and food systems to adapt to climate change while better preserving biodiversity”, he said.
Anne-Nathalie Volkoff, INRAE Research Director and an expert in agricultural pests, will coordinate PHIRC on the French side and emphasized the importance of bringing researchers together in search of solutions for a more sustainable world. “France and Brazil face the same challenges and share the same goal of improving planetary health, while the expertise, technologies, and capabilities of both countries are highly complementary. Working together will therefore amplify the impact of the research carried out within the center”, she said. Volkoff also emphasized that, in the short term, PHIRC will focus on developing projects aimed at creating strategies for plant protection, human nutrition, and digital agriculture.
Official inauguration of the office at USP’s Pirassununga campus – Photo: Welson Barbosa
At USP, PHIRC will be coordinated by professor Fernando Cônsoli of the Department of Entomology and Acarology at Esalq. Cônsoli emphasized that the group of scientists will focus on planetary health activities, which necessarily involve developing solutions to society’s challenges. “We have brought together a group of more than 210 researchers from both institutions, organized into five pillars for the development of specific projects”, he explained.
According to Cônsoli, the researchers involved in PHIRC will face the major challenge of addressing the impacts of accelerated climate change and its effects on planetary health. “Our goal is to generate knowledge that will improve food production while safeguarding human health, preserving the biodiversity of natural ecosystems, and promoting a better distribution of food in support of nutritional equity”, he said.
The meeting in Piracicaba concluded on the morning of Wednesday, July 8, with a series of technical visits to Esalq’s strategic laboratories.
Social impact and public policies
According to the organizers, PHIRC is being launched at a critical moment. Projections indicate that global temperatures are expected to exceed 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels by 2028, which could result in a 14% decline in global agricultural production by 2050. To help curb this crisis and mitigate the environmental costs, estimated at US$28.6 trillion by the middle of the century, the center will adopt the Planetary Health approach, which directly links human health to the integrity of the Earth’s ecosystems.
With a robust action plan for its first five years, PHIRC will promote short-term exchange programs for researchers and graduate students from both countries. Beginning in 2027, postdoctoral fellowships and joint proposals to major international funding programs will be launched. The goal is to produce more than 20 high-impact publications and train at least 15 early-career scientists during the first five years.
PHIRC’s management plan indicates that the new center will generate impacts extending far beyond the laboratory. From an economic and innovation perspective, the new ecosystem will foster new employment opportunities in the green economy, including biodefensives and robotics, while creating added value through the circular economy.
With regard to environmental and health-related issues, the center aims to reduce agriculture’s carbon footprint, decrease pesticide use, and optimize water resources. It also seeks to contribute to the formulation of public policies by generating scientific evidence to support government decision-making on food labeling, subsidies, and sustainable agriculture.
English version: Nexus Traduções, edited by Denis Pacheco
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