First Nobel Prize Summit to be held in Washington, D.C., April 29-May 1, 2020

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The first-ever Nobel Prize Summit, Our Planet, Our Future, will bring together Nobel Laureates and other world-renowned experts and leaders to advance new insights into global sustainable development and explore actions that need to be taken to ensure humanity’s future on a prosperous, stable, and resilient planet. The three-day summit will be held at the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, with related events expected to be held at other institutions and venues throughout Washington, D.C.

A particular focus will be given to climate change and biodiversity loss, rising inequality, and rapid societal transformation enabled by emerging and converging technologies. In addition to the Nobel Laureates, other attendees will include esteemed researchers, politicians, business executives, artists, and young leaders.

The summit is being hosted by the Nobel Foundation, in partnership with the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, and the Stockholm Resilience Centre/Beijer Institute.

The Nobel Foundation’s executive director Lars Heikensten said, “The prizes are awarded to those whose achievements have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind. Societies now face challenges unimaginable a century ago when Alfred Nobel wrote his will. Our summit will bring many great minds to bear on how to solve the world’s most pressing challenges and how to engage society, especially the youth, in doing so.”

“The young people are saying: Listen to the science,” said Johan Rockström, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and the Stockholm Resilience Centre. “The science is clear – we need a major economic transformation in the next decade to bend the curves of our destructive trajectories. We are now risking the stability of Earth’s life support system.”

The Nobel Prize Summit coincides with the first year of the U.N.’s “Decade of Action” to meet its Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.

“The power of science is in its predictive ability – to forecast what the future will be for the next generations based on choices we make today,” said National Academy of Sciences President Marcia McNutt. “By heeding the science, we can create an equitable, sustainable, and prosperous future for all people on this planet.”

“The role of science as fundamental for a sustainability transition. We now enter 2020 – a “Super Year” for international cooperation and policy – and the Nobel Prize Summit will be a key event to bring science and action together,” said Line Gordon, director of the Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University.

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To receive updates on the Nobel Prize Summit, visit the summit website at

http://www.

nobelprize.

org/

our-planet-our-future

. Journalists may contact the U.S. National Academy of Sciences’ Office of News and Public Information; +1-202-334-2138 or

[email protected]

.