Co-developing a network and agenda for interdisciplinary research

This project will build a new interdisciplinary network of research partners from the UK and Botswana and will centre around co-developing research ideas and future strategies through a Theory of Change (ToC) workshop and related field activities held at the Okavango Research Institute. The purpose of the grant is to get a sense from local communities in the Okavango region on their feelings toward their own involvement in natural resource management and how they feel more community involvement in land use would impact their livelihoods and attitudes towards wildlife conservation.

The aims of this research going forward are to identify how the UoE’s World Class data infrastructure can be utilised to support future land management in the region. We are specifically interested in exploring how Earth Observation data can be used to help develop resilient landscapes by (1) providing multi-scale maps of the social and ecological conditions in the region and how they respond to climatic events (2) how EO data could be used to track wild species movements across the region to provide a better data for planning migration corridors between protected areas, and most importantly; (3) how this EO data and world class data infrastructure could be converted into information products that can be utilised by local communities to better plan for livestock grazing movements, crop planting, minimising human-wildlife conflicts and maximising other livelihood opportunities. The network will co-develop a research agenda by developing systems diagrams from the outputs of the ToC workshop and field visits. These diagrams will be used to inform the partners of the gaps the networks current understanding and help direct future interdisciplinary research effort in-line with the Sustainable Development goals (SDGs).