Researcher
CurrentAt CEOBS I explore the environmental dimensions of conflict through open source data. This is a really wide role as there are a huge number of known and potential impacts on water, vegetation, air and biodiversity, with significant derived humanitarian consequences.Impacts range from the obvious short-term pollution incidents - such as the burning of oil fields - to more subtle longer-term changes as governance collapses - for example agricultural decline and desertification. Robustly characterising these impacts requires many open-source datasets including earth observations, social-media mining, conflict data and humanitarian reports. We are working on developing citizen science approaches to further expand the data at our disposal.Often I have to develop novel methodologies to use and integrate this data, as there is minimal precedent - the environmental dimensions of conflict are chronically understudied. This is something I am hoping to improve, by building a community of conflict monitoring from space.We are still a small team at CEOBS - so my role also includes writing blogs and reports, producing graphics, interviewing stakeholders, developing the organisation and bringing in funding, so we can grow and continue to monitor the environmental dimensions of conflict - these may be integral to building stable peace in contemporary conflict areas.
