News

UG scientist Christian Zuidema discusses how we can jointly move towards a sustainable society. A smart transition requires a better distribution of advantages and disadvantages, he argues.

The relation between rural areas and cities have been under pressure in recent years and require future-proof spatial solutions. This is why the Fertile Soils project, in which 10 knowledge institutes and 30 practical partners work together, investigates how rural areas and cities can work together on major challenges such as agricultural transition, housing construction and climate-proof water management. NWO is granting 5.5 million euros for 5 years of research.

Bringing together knowledge and experience will provide new educational opportunities for professionals working in a variety of organisations.

Wat kan Nederland leren van de manieren waarop andere landen in Europa basisvoorzieningen in het landelijk gebied weten te behouden? Op verzoek van het Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken en Koninkrijksrelaties hebben Bettina Bock, Tialda Haartsen en Kirsten Valkenier (Rijksuniversiteit Groningen) een vergelijking gemaakt van internationaal beleid voor het behoud van basisvoorzieningen in landelijk gebied. De onderzochte (constituerende) landen zijn Duitsland, IJsland, Schotland, Wales, Finland, Frankrijk en Denemarken.

During the second edition of the ENLIGHT Impact Awards on 11 June in Bilbao, the RUG won two of the six Impact Awards.

On 27 May, the EACEA in Brussels celebrated the fact that the first Erasmus Mundus Master’s degree programmes were launched twenty years ago.

Juliette de Wit, Femke Cnossen and Maite Laméris have received a YAG Grant of € 6,000 for an interdisciplinary project on the long-lasting socio-economic consequences of the ‘Arbeitseinsatz’ in the Netherlands. The grant enables them to explore ways to work with historical data from the Dutch National Archives that has recently been digitized and published. Using this dataset, they aim to understand the long-lasting effects of the Aarbeitseinsatz on future generations and communities, for instance in their civic engagement.

Margo van den Brink, associate professor of Water and Planning, says that we should adapt our spatial design to the changing climate. This implies difficult choices have to be made because the space is limited and the needs are great.

Investment in real estate appears to be an important explanation for the gap between big cities and the region, argues Michiel Daams, associate professor of Economic Geography of the Real Estate Market. He conducted research on investments in the United Kingdom and the United States.

Felix Pot has won the prestigious Van der Knaap Dissertation Prize from the Royal Dutch Society of Sciences and Humanities. He receives this award for his research on the perceived accessibility in rural areas, on which he defended in his dissertation in September 2023. This is the first time that a PhD candidate from the University of Groningen has won this prize.