PhD student in remote sensing of socio-ecology and agroforestry
Sam Harrison
Supervisors:
PhD Research
I am a third year PhD student, supervised by Casey Ryan and part of the LANDteam. My PhD research broadly looks at the biodiversity and the socioeconomic links to agroforestry in the tropics.
I am developing methods for mapping biodiversity in mosaic agroforestry landscapes, working with the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF), contributing to a Trees on Farms’ Biodiversity Assessment Tool as part of a bigger project to improve the ability of countries to meet biodiversity targets by harnessing the potential of trees in agricultral land. I will also be exploring the links between agroforestry adoption and community socioeconomic characteristics at a national scale. For this I am developing some small area-level models of these socioeconomic characteristics using small area estimation methods.
I am currently on-pause from PhD work, developing a global indicator for monitoring the biodiversity of trees on farms, to feed into the post-2020 global biodiversity targets, which are currently being negotiated.
My PhD is mainly funded by NERC E3 Docotoral Training Partnership, with contributions from ICRAF
Previous work and education
- As part of an internship with IIED, I contributed to the preparation of a new environment and climate change strategy for IFAD (International Fund for Agricultural Development)
- I conducted a baseline ecosystem service assessment for the Bubugo conservation trust in Uganda by carrying out mapping focus group discussions
- I carried out a degredation and deforestation assessment of forests along the Tana River, Kenya as part of an internship with the Northern Rangelands Trust
- MSc Environmental Monitoring, Modelling and Management at King’s College London
- BSc (Hons) Geography at the University of Edinburgh
