1.Disentangling Land-Use Change in Central Africa to Understand the Role of Local and Indigenous Communities in Forest Restoration and Conservation
The Congo Basin in Central Africa is the planet’s second largest tropical rainforest and home to a diverse group of 120 million people, many of whom live in poverty and are threatened by anthropogenic change. Difficult tradeoffs between food security, economic development and the conservation of these critical ecosystems emerge at the core of land-cover and land-use change (LCLUC) in the region. This project will map and quantify LCLUC and associated carbon emissions and explore the ecosystem service benefits of different restoration scenarios across an understudied and ecologically important region of the Congo Basin. This proposed project will be carried out at two spatial scales: 1) the Tri-National Dja-Odzala-Minkébé (TRIDOM) transboundary area that spans Cameroon, Gabon, and the Republic of Congo; and 2) the Dja Biosphere Reserve, buffer zone, and surrounding landscape matrix, located in southern Cameroon. LCLUC and carbon emissions mapping will be conducted at the landscape scale using high spatial resolution Planet data in combination with Landsat, Sentinel-1, and Sentinel-2. Recently developed carbon maps will additionally be used for carbon stocks and emissions mapping. To investigate the drivers of reforestation and deforestation, with an emphasis on reduced deforestation, household surveys and spatial econometric analyses will be conducted at the Dja site-scale. Ecosystem service analyses and modeling will be used to examine several regionally relevant forest restoration scenarios at both the site (Dja) and landscape (TRIDOM) scales. Findings from this proposed research will support improved understanding of a critical carbon cycle and LCLUC hotspot. The methods developed and results produced will also contribute to OSFAC forest monitoring and carbon emissions accounting efforts in the Congo Basin. More broadly, this research is intended to guide future policy in the region, inform sustainable land-use practices and target forest restoration efforts to maximize food security, socioeconomic wellbeing, carbon sequestration, and biodiversity conservation.
2. Implementation Grant: A Cultural, Learning, and Institutional Model to Accelerate Transformations for Environmental Justice (CLIMATE Justice) -2023-2027 ($7.5M)
Effective and equitable solutions to climate change will require a diverse and culturally competent geoscience workforce with a solid foundation in Earth system science, strong technical skills, and transdisciplinary expertise. To address this need, researchers at the University of California, Irvine (UCI) will work across disciplines to develop a Cultural, Learning, and Institutional Model to Accelerate Transformations for Environmental Justice (CLIMATE Justice). The primary goal of the CLIMATE Justice initiative is to transform the culture of the geosciences through building a learning ecosystem that brings on-the-ground challenges of environmental justice and sustainability into the heart of geoscience research and education. The project will approach climate change research in a holistic way that brings together multiple communities and addresses climate impacts and solutions, as well as social and environmental justice, systemic racism, and knowledge imperialism that discounts different ways of knowing. Program activities will center on training diverse cohorts of postbaccalaureate and PhD student fellows in core climate and geoscience skills, as well as community-engaged research and environmental justice. The cross-disciplinary experience with knowledge co-production gained through this project will uniquely position the participants to serve as agents of change in their careers, whether in academia or other fields. The project will have broad impacts for education, workforce development, broadening participation, and building capacity for addressing climate change. It will improve the culture, effectiveness, and economic benefits of geoscience research by creating a model for institutional change that emphasizes community engagement to tackle pressing environmental problems.
The CLIMATE Justice initiative will mobilize a cultural shift in the geosciences through a place-based approach that situates UCI’s global-scale climate research in a local community context. The specific project objectives are to: 1) Train and empower postbaccalaureate and PhD students from historically marginalized communities to pursue graduate education and careers related to climate change, 2) Increase participation of scientists from traditional STEM disciplines in environmental justice and community-engaged research, 3) Build strong cross-disciplinary collaborations between geoscientists and experts from other fields, such as social science, 4) Develop equitable partnerships with community-based organizations, and 5) Transform the culture of geoscience by building a learning ecosystem that spans traditional institutional, disciplinary, and hierarchical boundaries. CLIMATE Justice Fellows will co-develop research projects with community-based organizations focused on addressing climate change and environmental justice in Southern California. Through culturally aware mentorship and authentic community-engaged research experiences, underrepresented minorities and members of other marginalized communities will build scientific identities and a sense of belonging, increasing the diversity of people entering geoscience careers within and outside academia. Through its research and capacity-building goals, this project will have broad impacts for communities dealing with the impacts of climate and environmental change. Furthermore, it will provide a model for transforming the intellectual focus, research culture, and inclusiveness of academic geoscience departments across the United States and beyond.
This award reflects NSF’s statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation’s intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
3. UKRI GCRF TRADE, DEVELOPMENT, AND THE ENVIRONMENT HUB
Trade in natural and agricultural commodities has long been a key part of economic growth. However, not all growth is sustainable–removing too many wild animals or plants can cause populations to decline and ultimately crash while clearing land for crops removes important habitats for wildlife and threatens water, air, and soil resources. This degradation has a devastating impact on the environment as well as knock-on effects for marginalized people–if a forest empties of wildlife, or is cleared for commercial farming, there is little left for local people to live on. To protect our natural environment and support human development, we must take steps to make trade more sustainable. This project involves over 50 partner organizations from 15 different countries – aiming to help make sustainable trade a positive force in the world.
The Egoh’s Lab is co-leading work package 3 (WP3). Our work focuses on the social impacts of wildlife and commodity trade. We aim to look at both direct and indirect impacts as well as the positive and negative impacts of trade. We will focus on quantifying lost opportunities due to trade in terms of ecosystem services. We will derive indicators of well-being for different actors and stakeholders to demonstrate how trade affects well-being. Combined with value chain analysis, this will also demonstrate how the benefits and harms are distributed.
For more information visit! https://www.unep-wcmc.org/featured-projects/trade
4. Innovation Center for Advancing Ecosystem Climate Solutions
The broad aim of this project is to develop science and technology solutions to manage California’s natural lands for climate change. There are 4 work packages in this project. Egoh’s lab is involved in the mapping and valuing of key ecosystem services in California. Beneficiaries of forest restoration lack consistent, timely, and spatially relevant information on management effects on C, water, wildfire, and other ecosystem services. We aim to provide valuation methods that support planning and assessment of the multiple benefits of forests in California.
5. Sustainability of oil palm trade and improving livelihoods of smallholders
Although oil palm cultivation originated in Africa, the African continent is the lowest palm oil producer. However, this trend is changing as agricultural land becomes increasingly scarce in Southeast Asia, and regulatory pressures continue to intensify, Africa could become the next frontier for oil palm expansion. In addition, some African governments are targeting the sector for agricultural expansion to increase GDP and improve livelihoods. For example, Cameroon has a goal of doubling its palm oil production by 2035, relative to their 2010 baseline of 230,000 tons of crude palm oil per year (République du Cameroun, 2009) while Gabon, a country with very little area currently under cultivation, has ambitions of becoming a leading palm oil exporter by increasing production from 13,000 tons of crude palm oil in 2011 to 280,000 tons per year by 2025 (République Gabonaise, 2012). There are discussions to expand oil palm and sugarcane production partly for biofuel purposes in Ghana (Ahmed, 2017). The need to make oil palm production sustainable worldwide is critical, particularly in Africa with populations most vulnerable to climate change and whose livelihood depends on forest and agriculture.
This project seeks to work with smallholder farmers across Cameroon to understand the feasibility of a win-win situation where farmers voluntarily protect forests while farming in sustainable ways in exchange for some benefits.
6. SLOAN and HELLMAN Fellowships
Understanding impacts of climate change on ecosystem services. Developing methods for reducing uncertainty in mapping ecosystem services using machine learning techniques..