Alice visited Kiambu and Murang’a Districts of Kenya for follow-up household surveys. The goal of this exercise was to understand how seasonal climatic change can influence household cooking energy choices and usage patterns. She conducted about 300 household questionnaires along two transects, and interviewed local stakeholders such as forest officers, firewood sellers and biomass stove producers.
Denise conducted a household waste characterization study in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia. With the support of the local university UPSA and the municipal cleansing enterprise EMACRUZ, she coordinated a team of around 30 student volunteers to survey 105 households from different socioeconomic strata. This entailed daily waste collection, separation, weighing and analysis for 7 consecutive days. The results will elicit household waste generation rates across the city, which is an important input to a system dynamic model she develops.
Ei visited the Max Myanmar cement plant close to Naypyitaw, Myanmar. She collected data about the material and energy inputs and output for each of the production stages of cement production, from quarrying to final product. This information will be used to assess the environmental impacts of cement production through life cycle assessment (LCA).
Eric conducted household surveys in the Assin North District, Ghana to understand how cocoa certification affects the livelihood of smallholders. He collected 300 household surveys in 10 rural communities from certified and uncertified cocoa smallholders, as well as subsistence farmers not growing cocoa. Surveyed certified farmers had adopted different certification standards such as UTZ and Rainforest Alliance.
Helen conducted household surveys in Pyin Oo Lwin (Myanmar) to understand the benefits that green spaces offer to urban residents. She conducted 230 household surveys around five green spaces such as monasteries, a golf course and the National Botanical Gardens, as well as control areas in the city centre. These surveys captured, among others, the provisioning and cultural services that resident obtain from the green spaces, as well as how proximity to this spaces can reduce residents vulnerability to heat, drought, and air and noise pollution.
Robert visited the provinces of the Western Cape and the Gauteng in South Africa to interview experts about the current role of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in the country’s food system. He interviewed 18 experts from academia, NGOs, local/national government and the food industry to understand the structure of the food system, as well as the drivers, barriers and challenges of ICT adoption in the South African food system. He also presented the preliminary results of a consumer survey he conducted last winter, to the local farmers of the Izindaba Zokudla (Lit. "Conversation about Food") during their monthly workshop in Soweto.
Vinamra visited Iban communities in Anap Muput Forest Management Unit, Bintulu division in Sarawak, Malaysia. These Iban communities traditionally live in longhouses and rely for their sustenance on shifting agriculture of hill rice, cash crops (e.g. pepper, oil palm) and the collection of various timber and non-timber forest products. To understand the effects of past and current commercial logging practices in the area, he carried out 63 household interviews in 9 villages located in the Takan and Malat clusters in and around the forest management unit operated by Zedtee Snd. Bdh.
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