Transdiciplinary ‘systems’ researcher - concerned with transformative sustainability science. I am involved with empirical place based research,  alongside ‘research on research’ to explore transformative landscapes, transformative knowledge systems and associated science, technology and innovation policy.  I am Faculty Lead for Impact and Knowledge Exchange for the business school and passionate about contributing to enhanced understanding of research impact and how to evolve impactful and equitable research systems. I won the FT Research with Impact Award in 2022 for collaborative work in India, and am involved in participatory research and consultancy to understand, codify and nurture transformative research for development systems globally. 

I have over 2 decades experience in the design, management and implementation of large interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research and engagement initiatives in diverse contexts. I have a particular interest in sustainable land use, ecosystem service and well-being interactions, food and agricultural systems and in the concepts, methodologies and practices of transdisciplinary action research (working across natural and social scientists and with public sector and civil society organisations). 

Much of my empirical work is concerned with holistic landscape change - how to navigate and address multiple, potentially competing, development needs for sustainable development. In city regions a series of projects has examined the dynamics of the peri-urban interface and the impact of rapid social and environmental change on the livelihoods of poor and marginalised people. It has explored multiple interrelated dimensions of resource flows (and the food-water-energy nexus), environmental change, health and social justice in the context of rapid urbanisation (particularly in South Asia). With an emphasis on initiatives to recast research policy and urban planning initiatives through a sustainability lens that combines environmental and social justice considerations and mechanisms for building resilience from below. All of this feeds into a long term active interest in the exploration and development of practical concepts to help support systemic transformative change in research for development and in wider science systems.

Elsewhere I am working with colleagues in Indonesia to consider sustainable food production policies and interventions which will also enhance climate resilience, biodiversity and farmers livelihoods.  In the UK I am involved in collaborative work concerned with sustainable and inclusive land use planning that integrates nature recovery. With colleagues in informatics we are developng an open source landscape mapping and modelling platform (LIMMMA) which supports these types of initiatives around the globe by helping to collaboratively visualise and analyse the changing functions and diverse values attributed to landscapes, the role of different types of evidence in informing nature recovery and climate resilient land use strategies and synergies and trade-offs involved. 

I have worked on various aspects of food system resilience - with a particular interests in adaptation to local environmental change and in International agricultural research strategy. In the UK I am the Sussex academic lead for the Partnerships in Sustainable Food Futures Interdisciplinary doctoral training centre led by the University of Greenwich and coordinated at Sussex through the Sussex Sustainability Research Programme.

I have lived and worked extensively overseas. At the University of the South Pacific, I examined benefits of intercropping for smallholder farmers; and at ICRISAT, In Hyderabad, India I researched resource partitioning in agroforesty systems. I have continued to work extensively in South Asia on food and agriculture systems, environmental pollution and peri-urban environmental change, and to undertake research and consultancy assignments on sustainable development and transformative research systems in Eastern and Southern Africa, Indonesia, China, New Zealand and Latin America.

I have a BSc Hons degree from the University of Reading in Plant Sciences/Agricultural Botany, and a PhD from the University of Nottingham in tropical crop ecology and environmental physics. Before joining SPRU at the University of Sussex in 2004 (where I was Deputy Director of SPRU and Head of Operations from 2005-2009 and subsequently held various Business School management roles including Acting Head of School, and Director of Student Experience), I was a lecturer in Agricultural Development at Imperial College London (1995-2004). Here I led research and policy engagement initiatives on the impacts of environmental pollution on agriculture and associated livelihoods, and established cross campus initiatives concerning International Development. Prior to this I worked in the NGO sector, initially as Overseas projects coordinator at the Henry Doubleday Foundation where she established an information and advisory service for sustainable agriculture initiatives in southern and Eastern Africa. As a consultant, again working across the research, policy and practice divides, I developed an integrated pest management support initiative for southern African NGOs, provided advice to the Stockholm Environment Institute (on assessing pollution impact in developing countries and on regional dialogues on socio-economic impacts) and to DFID on realising potential of research outputs from the Environment Research Programme.