At this event, The University of Manchester's Dr Johan Oldekop and Dr Rose Pritchard joined the Sustainable Futures Seminar Series to discuss social and environmental outcomes of conservation interventions and data justice in biodiversity conservation and ecosystem restoration. The event brought in over 50 internal and external attendees.
Professor Holly Shiels, Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health and Sustainable Futures Healthy Futures challenge area lead, was the chair of the event.
Dr Johan Oldekop, Senior Lecturer in Environment & Development, Global Development Institute, presented first on "Complex policies for complex landscapes: Understanding relative social and environmental outcomes of conservation interventions".
Dr Oldekop argued that “Designing and implementing policy interventions that jointly address social and environmental challenges remains an urgent and intractable problem. Our understanding of the relative effects and interactions of different interventions that co-occur in space and time, and how their multiple impacts are influenced by broader socio-economic changes remains limited due four key research limitations. First, analyses have predominantly estimated effects of single interventions or processes of change; Second studies have focused on single outcomes without considering multiple, simultaneous outcomes; Third, research has largely not been able to control for confounding socio-economic, political and biophysical factors; Finally, many studies of conservation and development interventions have been conducted at single points in time and have thus been unable to capture social and environmental dynamics over time”.
Dr Oldekop ended his segment by participating in a live Q&A session with the attendees.
Dr Rose Pritchard, Presidential Academic Fellow in Social-Environmental Systems atThe Global Development Institute, spoke next on " Just transitions in a data-fied world: data justice in biodiversity conservation and ecosystem restoration".
Dr Pritchard said that "Advances in digital technologies have transformed the kinds of data available about rural landscapes and the ways that data can be used in conservation research and practice. While this creates exciting opportunities, often forgotten is that data are never entirely neutral. The kinds of data collected, and the uses to which these data are put, reflect the different sets of values and relationships of power shaping conservation landscapes. This means that data could be used to advance equitable, impactful conservation efforts, or alternatively could serve to reinforce unjust conservation practices harmful to particular peoples, species, or ecosystems".
At the end of her presentation, Dr Pritchard answered some questions from the attendees.
Our chair, Professor Holly Shiels thanked the attendees and our guest speakers and closed the event.
Watch the recording of the seminar here!
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