The field lab participants of the unconference, who had come together for a multi-disciplinary approach to examining the climate issue over four weeks in Kathmandu, Nepal (Source: Understanding Risk Field Lab 2024) 

The participants invited to the field lab came from myriad disciplines, running the gamut from climate scientists to career artists. Dynamic working groups selected the key themes of the field lab, and led conversations and projects around their respective topics. Outputs from the event were varied and creative, and included story maps, educational collaterals on climate risk and an art exhibition developed from the climate perceptions of local people. In the spirit of fostering an inclusive and cross-disciplinary setting, participants across the field lab were also encouraged to contribute to the projects of other working groups, creating a vibrant melting pot of ideas during the unconference. 

I felt very fortunate to have the opportunity to attend the conference. It was exciting to contribute to a space that values cross-disciplinary perspectives, and it was a great platform for me to explore the intersection between climate data and public policy – a topic I am pursuing in my studies. I met many people of different backgrounds and learnt through the myriad lenses with which they studied climate change, such as anthropological approaches, media communications, data visualisation and ecological impacts. I also had deep discussions about the importance of relaying climate information in an audience-centric and digestible manner. 

A common challenge among my fellow participants, many of whom were graduate students figuring out their own research, was the distillation of key research points that would be the most relevant and important to society. What kind of climate information would be most impactful? How can our research help the average Nepali citizen, or someone living in the Hindu Kush region? And how can we communicate our findings or create tools that can be easy to use? 

When I shared about my recent experience of applying design thinking to a policy context at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, where I am currently completing my Master’s degree, many participants got curious about its user-centric approach and potential to help people understand their end-users better. This inspired me to craft a small workshop that introduced my field lab peers to design thinking, which, to my pleasure, was warmly received. A meaningful exercise we did together during the workshop was a mini-interview with each other, where we roleplayed an end-user or target group of our research. This helped us identify the key climate information needs of our audience-of-interest. While short and simple, the workshop got everyone thinking about climate data needs from the end-user point of view instead of a knowledge gap viewpoint. 

I gave an introduction to design thinking as a way to help my peers rethink their data in a user-centric way (Source: Sherene Tan/ Earth Observatory of Singapore)

Among the many workshops delivered during the conference, Dr Indraneel Kasmalkar, a Research Fellow at the Earth Observatory of Singapore (EOS) working on the Southeast Asia Sea-level Program’s (SEA2 Program), led one on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning. He shared about the random forest algorithm and guided us through a hands-on walkthrough on how this algorithm can be used to develop a landslide model which would show areas on a map that may be more prone to landslides.  

Dr Indraneel Kasmalkar explaining about the random forest decision tree during his AI workshop during the field lab (Source: Sherene Tan/ Earth Observatory of Singapore) 

Another field lab participant from EOS was Ms Sonali Manimaran, a final-year PhD student at the Asian School of the Environment. Part of the climate mobilities working group, she contributed to many discussions on climate migrations during the unconference. She held a workshop on climate migration modelling and led a group of field lab members on a weekend field trip to Melamchi to interview and better understand the lived experience of climate impacts and migration by the locals. 

Ms Sonali Manimaran had led a field trip team to Melamchi to learn more about the lived experiences of climate change by local Nepali residents in the rural area (Source: Sherene Tan/ Earth Observatory of Singapore) 

Other interesting outputs and activities from the field lab participants include a small anthropological project called A Portrait of a Tree, which compiled local accounts and perceptions of trees in their lives, as well as the production of a painting, ‘Mountains on Fire’, and insightful talks and discussions on the progress of renewable energy adoption. 

The UR Himalayan Climate Data Field Lab 2024 was an incredibly enriching and meaningful experience which exposed me to many different approaches to thinking about the climate issue. Everyone had something unique to bring to the table, and the open-ended format of the field lab enabled all of us to create a beautiful melting pot of ideas. I believe we left the field lab feeling really inspired, and I am sure that we will use what we have learnt to drive innovative and collaborative approaches to climate science, which will be an undoubtedly important feat as the world enters a new age of tackling the climate crisis.