Research
The focus of my research is the socio-economic relationship between protected areas and local communities in Sub-Saharan Africa. Or more specifically: How do people benefit or lose as a result of living next to a protected area and how does this influence their conservation attitudes and behaviors?
My research is positioned within the local, regional, and global socio-economic context of the protected area, and investigates how incentives, disincentives, and socio-economic conditions influence conservation attitudes and behaviors of local people. I am particularly interested in tourism revenue sharing, loss compensation, and protected area resource access and extraction.
From 2008 to 2012 I worked around Kibale National Park in the western region of Uganda and in 2013 started working around Murchison Falls National Park and the surrounding reserves in northern Uganda.
As a mixed methods researcher, with the aid of my Ugandan field assistants, we start research projects by running focus groups to get a general understanding of the sources of benefit and loss identified by community members, and general attitudes towards the protected area. In addition, structured and semi-structured interviews are conducted with government officials, the wildlife authority, and managers of non-profit organizations, tourism facilities, research, carbon sequestration or any other development operations active in the area. We then use a survey to collect household information, including: demographics, socio-economics, livelihood activities, perceived benefits and losses, and perceptions about the parks and natural resources.With my research assistants, we also measure illegal resource extraction proximate to each village and measure the losses accrued by local households as a result of human-wildlife conflict.
My research is positioned within the local, regional, and global socio-economic context of the protected area, and investigates how incentives, disincentives, and socio-economic conditions influence conservation attitudes and behaviors of local people. I am particularly interested in tourism revenue sharing, loss compensation, and protected area resource access and extraction.
From 2008 to 2012 I worked around Kibale National Park in the western region of Uganda and in 2013 started working around Murchison Falls National Park and the surrounding reserves in northern Uganda.
As a mixed methods researcher, with the aid of my Ugandan field assistants, we start research projects by running focus groups to get a general understanding of the sources of benefit and loss identified by community members, and general attitudes towards the protected area. In addition, structured and semi-structured interviews are conducted with government officials, the wildlife authority, and managers of non-profit organizations, tourism facilities, research, carbon sequestration or any other development operations active in the area. We then use a survey to collect household information, including: demographics, socio-economics, livelihood activities, perceived benefits and losses, and perceptions about the parks and natural resources.With my research assistants, we also measure illegal resource extraction proximate to each village and measure the losses accrued by local households as a result of human-wildlife conflict.
Current Projects
PECAR: Population, Environment, and Climate in the Albertine Rift
A research project managed by Dr. J. Hartter and Dr. S. Ryan. I am a collaborator on the project with responsibility to manage qualitative research activities around Murchison Falls National Park, Uganda. Our study aims to understand the influence of population change, oil exploration, climate change, and conservation policy on people-park relations and conservation objectives for the park.
A research project managed by Dr. J. Hartter and Dr. S. Ryan. I am a collaborator on the project with responsibility to manage qualitative research activities around Murchison Falls National Park, Uganda. Our study aims to understand the influence of population change, oil exploration, climate change, and conservation policy on people-park relations and conservation objectives for the park.
Conservation and Primary Education: In collaboration with Dr. R. Sengupta this study investigates the influence of Kibale National Park on the probability that children will complete four years of primary school, the minimum standard set by UNICEF. Also, in collaboration with the Kasiisi Project and UNITE, non-profit organizations trying to improve primary education around the park, we are tracking primary leaving exam results for 36 primary schools to determine if education quality is improving around the park.
Conservation Strategy Framework: Conservation strategy in East Africa was inherited from colonial history, evolved by global conservation trends, and modified by integrated conservation and development initiatives introduced primarily by international agencies. Frameworks for more analytical approaches to determining effective conservation strategies have been proposed but rarely tested. Collaborating with Dr. J. Hartter and Dr. T. Baird, we are investigating whether scale needs to considered when recommending people-park strategies based on data from two protected areas: Kibale National Park, Uganda and Tarangire National Park, Tanzania.
Reflections on Qualitative Research: Dr. S. Turner, Dr. J. Christensen and I are writing qualitative methods papers as a writing team. Following the success of our group paper 'Dear diary: Early career geographers collectively reflect on their qualitative field research experiences', awarded the biennial prize by the Journal of Geography in Higher Education, we have written a reflective piece about the Dear Diary experience. In addition, we have written a paper (published by Qualitative Research) about the challenges of getting results back to participants and managing expectations with regard to the influence of the researcher to help broker change for the less represented. Following a discussion panel at the Association for American Geographers we are reflecting on translated meaning and the social position of interpreters in the field.