The project is carried out by researchers from different academic backgrounds with extensive experience working on shifting agriculture, rural development, social forestry, forest ecology and ecosystem services.
Research Team
Grace Wong
Project leader
Grace Wong is a natural resource economist and has carried out research on the political and social-ecological dynamics in forest, development and climate change governance. Her first foray into fieldwork was in the forest frontiers in Sabah, Malaysia Borneo almost 25 years ago for her Master’s thesis, which examined livelihoods of swidden farmers living in and around conservation areas. Her current research at the Stockholm Resilience Centre and the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature focus on social-environmental justice in forest frontiers, with a particular interest on power relations, precarity, gender, and agency (resistance) – and come full circle back to Sabah, as one of five research sites in the FairFrontiers project.
Alimata Sidibe
Researcher
Alimata is working on Module 2 and is leading the field work on land use and ecosystem services. She is from Mali and graduated with a PhD from Department of Global Environmental Studies, Kyoto University. She has field experience in West Sub-Saharan Africa, where she examined air pollutants emission and exposure sources and their relationship with anthropogenic activities and health.
Andi Patiware Metaragakusuma
Researcher
Kusuma is from Indonesia and completed her PhD in Rural Development at Ehime University, Japan. For her PhD, she examined the socio-economics of communities linked to environmental issues in North Luwu Regency, Indonesia. More recently, she has carried out studies on transdisciplinary communities of practices (TDCOPs) to overcome the mercury pollution caused by artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) activities in Gorontalo, Indonesia with the RIHN SRIREP project.
Wai Phyoe Maung
Researcher
Wai is from Myanmar and has a PhD in Area Studies from Kyoto University. He has conducted research on tropical forest management, and the diverse livelihoods of local people in rural areas. He has field experience in the forests of Myanmar, Korea, and Japan, and is passionate about exploring the intricate dynamics of local communities and forest management.
Azwar Azmillah Sujaswara
Research Associate
Azwar will be joining us as Research Associate in Land Use and Land Cover Change Detection. He is from Indonesia, and graduated from Kyoto University’s Graduate School of Agriculture, where he specialized in Forest and Biomaterial Science. Currently he is a GIS, Remote Sensing, and UAV Specialist at ALGM Solution, based at IPB University. He has contributed to various projects including Rainforest Alliance Indonesia as an independent GIS and Remote Sensing consultant.
Ayami Kan
Research Associate
Ayami provides administrative support for the project. She is also involved in policy and discourse analysis of forest and land policies in Sabah and Sarawak. She has a MSc in Environment and Development Studies and has research experience in the field of development policy, with a focus on agrarian communities in Asian countries.
Collaborative Researchers
Maria Brockhaus University of Helsinki
Thilde Bech Bruun University of Copenhagen
Aristide Chacgom Green Development Advocates
Nyein Chan Kyoto University of Advanced Science
Kelvin Egay Universiti Malaysia Sarawak
Noboru Ishikawa Kyoto University
Gordon John PACOS TRUST
Christine Lain Forgotten Parks Foundation
Ole Mertz University of Copenhagen
Moira Moeliono CIFOR–ICRAF
Blaise-Pascal Ntirumenyerwa Mihigo University of Kinshasa
Jules Fortunat Nkongolo Mukaya Center for Intercultural and Interdisciplinary Research for Sustainable Development in Southern and Central Africa
Daisuke Naito Kyoto University
Muhammad Alif K. Sahide Universitas Hasanuddin
Shoko Sakai Hong Kong Baptist University
Odirilwe Selomane University of Pretoria
Maria Tengö Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University
Sithong Thongmanivong National University of Laos
Former Researchers
Ahmad Dhiaulhaq
Boon Kia Meng
Catherine Hepp
Samuel Assembe-Mvondo