People

Journalism & Communication, Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation, Gender and Social Studies

Indonesian origin. Shintia started her career as a journalist and developed expertise in communications and publishing, both for commercial and nonprofit. She pursued her master's degree at Wageningen University in the Netherlands, focusing on social studies and the technical environment. Halfway through her career, she cultivated more interest in research and joined CIFOR which shaped her knowledge of REDD+, gender, and the environment. She later joined UNOPS which sharpened her program management skills and knowledge of peatland restoration. She is currently working in the climate change mitigation and adaptation sector, focusing her work on Nature-based Solution Projects in Asia and the Pacific. She is pursuing her PhD, focusing her research on customary government, indigenous people, and sustainable forest landscapes.

Fideline Mboringong is an International Development professional with an MSc in International Cooperation (Environmental Management and Sustainable Development) from the International Relations Institute of Cameroon (IRIC) and Università Cà Foscari de Venise.

Fideline has over 8 years of experience in promoting sustainable environmental and socio- economic development. She specializes in policy analysis, private sector engagement, participatory community based natural resource management and sustainable agricultural value chains development. She is interested in research on exploring scenarios of balancing economic development and biodiversity conservation in relation to landscape change.  She is also interested in the intersection between Biodiversity Conservation, Science-Policy and Practice Interfaces.

Prior to joining VFL, Fideline was the Sustainable Development Hub Coordinator for WWF Governance Practice in Cameroon.

Erdi Lazuardi has over 20 years of experience in marine conservation. He has worked as a Reef Check Officer for WWF-Indonesia and collaborated with various NGOs, including Conservation International Indonesia and the Coral Triangle Center. He co-founded Cetasi (cetasindonesia.org), an organization dedicated to marine mammal protection, as well as Tanah Air Beta (tanahairbeta.org), which focuses on shared learning in conservation, and Bionesia (bionesia.org), aimed at enhancing Indonesian biodiversity through research and capacity building. Erdi supervises the application of scientific research and monitoring and evaluation for WWF-Indonesia’s Marine and Fisheries Program. He holds a bachelor's degree in marine science from Bogor Agricultural University (IPB) and a master’s degree in development practice from James Cook University (JCU). As a marine ecologist with over five years of experience in Raja Ampat, he specializes in coral reefs and cetacean surveys. Additionally, he enjoys playing the guitar and harmonica during fieldwork to foster a relaxed atmosphere.

Previously, Erdi served as WWF-Indonesia’s National Coordinator for Marine Science before embarking on a PhD journey at the University of British Columbia with the Vibrant Forest Landscapes Lab.

Martha Petrou has a background in ecology and conservation with a BSc degree from the University of Lancaster, UK. Martha has 3 years of professional experience working with BirdLife Cyprus in wildlife crime and restoration efforts of near-extinct bird populations. She has previously worked extensively with telemetry and geospatial data to aid wildlife crime investigations, while also leading relevant community-engaged projects and research. 

Jatna Supriatna

Professor Jatna Supriatna is the current Chairman of Research Center for Climate Change University of Indonesia. He is based at the Department of Biology, Faculty of Mathematics and Science (Conservation Biology), University of Indonesia. Jatna is an active member of several international organizations, including IUCN-World Conservation of Protected Area, IUCN-Specialist Survival Commision-Primate Specialist Group, International Primatological Society, Society for Conservation Biologist and many others. Jatna has worked extensively to support biodiversity conservation in Indonesia. Among his many contributions to conservation science are the discoveries of new primates in Indonesia such as Tarsius tumpara (new species found in Siau Island with his friends) and Macaca togianus (in Togean island) and the hybrid animals in Sulawesi. A full profile can be found here.

Research Gate | Google Scholar

Dwi Amalia Sari

Dwi completed her PhD at James Cook University, Cairns, Australia. After completing her PhD, Dwi went back to work at the Supreme Audit Board of Indonesia. Dwi is passionate about sustainable development and seeks to identify and implement improvements in natural resource governance in Indonesia.

In her PhD, Dwi assessed multi-sectoral governance natural resources in three landscapes in Indonesia. She used professionally accepted auditing standards as well as Actor Network Analysis and Multi Criteria Analysis (V.I.S.A) as tools to analyse the performance, effectiveness, and efficiency of governance. Dwi’s research findings suggest that landscapes in Indonesia have distinct social, political, financial, and ecological aspects that should influence governance decisions. Her results show that strong leadership, multi-sectoral collaboration to manage trade-offs, and a combination of top-down and bottom-up approaches is needed to steer sustainable development in Indonesia. Dwi is currently working with government bodies in Indonesia to develop ways of implementing improvements at the regional and national scale. She is actively engage with the VFL team members in different parts of Indonesia.

ResearchGate

Rumi Naito

Rumi obtained her Ph.D. in the Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability (IRES) at the University of British Columbia (UBC), focusing on behavioral psychology applied to conservation and natural resource management in tropical landscapes. She is also a Liu Scholar at the Liu Institute for Global Issues and a UBC’s Four Year Doctoral Fellowship recipient. Drawing on insights from cognitive psychology, her doctoral research investigated: 1) how land-users perceive conservation challenges differently and make subsequent land-use decisions; and 2) what interventions might facilitate desired behavioral change for sustainability.

Prior to her doctoral studies at UBC, Rumi worked with an Indonesia-based consulting firm, Starling Resources, as a senior project manager on a number of projects concerning collaborative land-use planning, forestry policies, reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+), ecosystem restoration, sustainable peatland management, agroecology, and community-based economic development. She holds a Master's degree in International Affairs from the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University in New York, with a focus on Environmental Policy Studies for Southeast Asia.

In her spare time, she enjoys training capoeira, traveling, hiking, and pottery.

Linked In | Behavioural Sustainability Lab | CHANS Lab

Chris Margules

Research Gate |RCCC UI

Lauren Nerfa

Lauren did her PhD at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, Department of Botany. She is originally from Vancouver, British Columbia, and lived in the Caribbean at a young age which influenced her current research interest in tropical forest ecology. Lauren completed her BSc and MSc at the University of British Columbia. Her academic background is in ecology and ecosystem-based management, as well as household forest dependence in the tropics. While conducting research in Borneo during her undergraduate degree, she realized the importance of incorporating human values and needs into ecological conservation approaches, especially in tropical forests.  She now focuses on ethnoecology, particularly ethnobotany, and is fascinated by human-ecosystem interactions.

Lauren's research focuses on human dimensions and ecological outcomes of community-based forest restoration in Hawaiʻ i.  The overarching aim of the project is to support the communities with land use decision-making that bolsters community well-being and ecosystem integrity, and to provide insights that can be applied towards social-ecological sustainability and resilience in similar tropical contexts. Lauren hopes to continue this work on Seram island in Indonesia in the future.

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Agus Kastanya

Agus Kastanya is a Professor at the Department of Forestry, Faculty of Agriculture, at Pattimura University, Ambon, Indonesia. Prof Agus has many years of experience working in sustainable forest management in Indonesia. Based in Ambon, Maluku, he works closely with government agencies, NGOs, and communities to develop forest management programs on small islands, taking a landscape - seascape approach. He coordinates several research projects, facilitating multi-stakeholder partnerships between local and international organisations, including UNPATTI and UBC. More information on Prof Agus' research, teaching and recent achievements can be found here.

Ayumi Ono

Ayumi  did her MSc with the Vibrant Forest Landscapes Lab in UBC Forest Conservation Sciences. She was born in Japan and became interested in the relationship between nature and people in her childhood, through her travel to  the countryside, mountain trekking, and eating. When she was in high school,  she visited a tropical rain forest in Thailand and was impressed by the complex dynamics in forests. Ayumi studied Forestry at Kyoto University in Japan; her research topic was the low impact logging on biodiversity in Indonesia. Following her bachelor’s degree, Ayumi worked for the Forestry Agency in Japan around eight years. The position included various roles - from the international department to a local forest office in Kyushu Island.

In 2021, while joining UBC as MSc student, Ayumi explored how to integrate forest conservation and local livelihoods in deforested areas. She is especially interested in mosaic landscapes that harmonize human and nature interactions to improve sustainability. Making the most of her experience in Japan, she is exploring how Japanese traditional land management approaches like SATOYAMA can be applied to Indonesia. Ayumi has enjoyed learning about diverse forest issues around the world. She is now based in Bali, Indonesia working for JICA on mangrove restoration in the tropics.

Emmanuel Acheampong

Emmanuel Acheampong has BSc. (Hons) and MPhil degrees in development planning at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana, and Master of Philosophy (Agriculture, Environment, and Related Studies) and PhD at James Cook University, Australia. He is a researcher at James Cook University, Australia. Since 2012, Emmanuel has been researching sustainable development issues in Ghana and other developing countries and has acquired significant experience in community engagement and environmental conservation over the years in Ghana. Emmanuel’s research in Ghana has been focusing on forest restoration and management through community participation, and livelihood improvement of farmers in forest fringe communities. Through Emmanuel’s innovative ideas, he was able to secure a 50 ha degraded forestland from the Forestry Commission of Ghana to assess the feasibility of engaging local farmers to restore the degraded land and examine the benefits thereof using the landscape approach. Since 2017, Emmanuel has been able to engage about 30 farmers in forest fringe communities of Ghana to restore about 20 ha of the degraded forest reserve through which the livelihoods of the farmers have been significantly improved. Details of the project can be found at www.ecomafghana.org.

Emmanuel desires to continue his engagement with smallholders in forest fringe Ghana in forest landscape restoration programs through which rural livelihoods are developed. Emmanuel believes that sustainable forest conservation, restoration, and management should always have the active participation of the local people because they are the most direct stakeholders of the forests and indigenous knowledge cannot be neglected. Assessing the feasibility of introducing non-timber forest products in planted forests for the benefit of indigenous people is Emmanuel’s next plan of action.

ResearchGate | Google Scholar

Abstract

Initiatives to strengthen small-scale forestry have proliferated in the recent decades. Existing literature has identified multiple factors that may hinder or improve the adaptive capacity of small-scale forestry, considering small-scale operations or business activities as an alternative to the large-scale industrial model that has long dominated the world’s forests. More recent research on business systems and strategies suggest a need to employ systems thinking, or business ecosystem approaches, to decipher complex relationships between different types and sizes of businesses rather than focusing on a specific business type or size. This thesis addresses this knowledge gap by combining insights from business literature and practices, and previous studies on sustainable and resilient livelihoods. Case studies of British Columbia, Canada, and Maluku Province, Indonesia were investigated to understand how business ecosystems unfolded in forest landscapes with different ecological and socio-economic backgrounds. The study in British Columbia focused on a local forest initiative created by the City of Quesnel to encourage innovation and improve the resilience of the local forest industry. The data was collected through interviews with government officials, non-governmental organizations, tertiary education institutions, and industry actors and applied actor network analysis methods to examine the role of different forest actors in the knowledge and business networks. The study in Indonesia investigated the way in which local communities in two villages on Seram Island, in Eastern Indonesia, used business activities to improve their livelihoods and adapt to their changing landscapes. Government regulations and previous participatory appraisal data obtained by non-governmental organizations were used to identify business network and landscape conditions that influence the operation of small-scale businesses and tenure holders. The findings reveal that business ecosystems in British Columbia and Indonesia are shaped by policy frameworks concerning land and tenure rights, which influence the dynamics of business and knowledge networks. This thesis highlights the importance of analysing how the underpinning policy framework affects the role and positions of each actor in their respective business ecosystem. The findings of this thesis suggest further research on the application of the business ecosystem framework to achieve sustainable and resilient livelihoods in forest landscapes.

Link to full thesis

Abstract

Local forest initiatives such as Community Forests and Social Forestry have been growing in recent decades to improve community participation and address landscape problems where factors such as poverty and forest degradation interact. Although participation has broadly increased, some communities still struggle to utilize these initiatives to improve forest governance. This thesis aims to address this phenomenon through a social relational approach to resource governance and policy analysis to understand how participation in decentralized forestry processes, as a function of policy context, influences local forest governance. Case studies of different communities in British Columbia, Canada and Indonesia are at different stages of developing and I have examined their local forest initiatives to provide insights on this phenomenon. The study in British Columbia (Chapter 2) focuses on local forest initiatives in Cariboo Regional District and Central Kootenay District to understand the challenges and opportunities of different communities in attempts to establish and manage their community forests. Data were collected through online interviews with governments, non-governmental organizations, and community members. The study in Indonesia (Chapter 3) investigates the implementation of Indonesia’s Social Forestry program and its influence on community participation in Social Forestry processes in Maluku Province. The research presented here reveals that communities will need to navigate through two crucial phases in developing their local forest initiatives to improve governance. In the first phase, social conflicts tend to be more prevalent as communities struggle to manage differences in aspirations and agendas to establish a common vision for their local forest initiative. This is the phase of heightened social conflicts. Local forest initiatives will then naturally transition to an operational stage marked by harvesting, marketing, and selling of their forest products. At this phase communities are likely to benefit from building forest expertise to improve effectiveness of management. Both phases influence the effectiveness of communities’ self-organization in utilizing social or community forests to improve benefits. Throughout each stage, the policy context shapes the way people participate in decentralized forestry processes. Insights from this study can help further research on utilizing community participation for improving local forest decision making.

Link to full thesis