We are using field work, field experiments and modelling approaches to analyse the interactions between humans and ecosystems – and consequently – between humans and wildlife. Our main focus are human-modified tropical landscapes in Eastern and Southern Africa, looking in particular at the role forested ecosystems play in supporting people’s livelihoods but also how that role has been changing (and will continue to change) with rapidly increasing land use and population pressures.
We are especially interested in predicting, how human-ecosystem interactions are changing the functions of ecosystems in the landscape (e.g. their productivity, their carbon storage, their capacity to regulate micro-climate and water flows) and how this translates to changes in benefits and resources that ecosystems can supply to people and human well-being (also termed ecosystem services).
Active projects: (1) Room to roam and hotspots of conservation conflicts – Lions, ungulates and people in the matrix. Funded through NERC DTP IAPETUS. Link. (2) Agrisys Tanzania. Funded through BBSRC GCRF. Link.
Previous projects: (1) Measuring, mapping and predicting forest and crop quality in human-modified tropical landscapes. Pilot project funded through Royal Society Research Grant. Link.
Keywords: (1) change dynamics (rapidly or slowly, immediately or with a time-delay?), (2) response types (threshold responses to environmental drivers, linear responses) and feedbacks