ECN Webinar Recap: Seed Grant Awardees

Earlier this month, six early career researchers who were awarded seed grants shared insights from their experiences on project design, implementation, and adaptation in practice. 

Hao Xia and Sally Torres dove into their projects on Monitoring progress towards adequate and representative protection of the Arctic Tundra, and Inhabiting Regenerative Edges: Sensory Walks as a Visual Methodology to Read, Walk, and Design Multispecies Landscapes, respectively. Together, they brought their experience in what it takes to come up with a project idea, how they narrowed the scope, and what were some of the hard decisions they had to make in the early stages of their project.

Following Hao, and Sally, Olivia del Giorgio, and Sergio Ceballos discussed project design and implementation. Olivia’s project, Skinking roots (Hundiendo Raices), explored the decision making process with her work in the Chaco, in Argentina investigating large-spread dispossession of land – particularly forested land – to extractive industries through community workshops. Sergio connected the conversation through his work on Urban and Peri-Urban forests in San Miguel Tucuman, Argentina, and the effects of urban forests on socio-environmental inequities.

Rounding out the discussion, Ana Merlo, and Alberto Anticolli discussed how they had to adapt their projects and learn through uncertainty. Ana discussed how her project, Impacts of agricultural intensification on soil quality: towards a comprehensive risk mitigation strategy, was impacted by the dangers of working in the “Avocado Strip”, where many pesticides are used and impacting the soil and water quality. Using a participatory approach, Ana was able to effectively expand their outreach efforts to non-agriculture actors. Alberto’s project, Integrating participatory approaches in the analysis of rural land conflicts in the Alto Parana Atlantic Forest, is working on two workshops in Brazil and Argentina using citizen science methods. One of the key takeaways from his experience was that time flexibility is crucial AND your research agenda may not always go as you originally planned.

Thank you to all six of our awardees, our partners with START, and to our SSC facilitators, Sofia Nanni, and Vimbayi Chimonyo!

Join the ECN and check out the recording here