My research explores the links between education and biodiversity conservation. I am particularly interested in how conservation NGOs implement education programmes in rural communities in Madagascar and how they affect local cultures, environments and knowledge systems. I have mainly been doing qualitative research using interviews, focus groups and participant observation as methodologies.

Projects

Unpacking the role of education as a tool for biodiversity conservation

Land is a powerful asset, but it also has a social function. Its economic and social aspects are central in advancing gender equality. Legal control of land as well as legal and social recognition of women’s uses of and rights to land, can also have catalytic effects of empowerment, increasing women’s influence and status in their homes and communities. My article-based PhD thesis focuses on Chinese rural women and their social and equal status in Chinese society. The research has received funding from Academy of Finland's Actors, Structures and Law (ASLA) - project

Projects

Rural women´s land rights in China

I am a doctoral researcher in areas of smart and sustainable mobility in rural communities at university of oulu

I am a doctoral researcher at the UEF Law School. My PhD research focuses specifically on international, transnational, and regional climate change laws and policies, gender based adaptation laws and policies, and socio-economic resilience of rural women. Through my research, I aim to conduct comparative case studies on Bangladesh and the Finnish Arctic. I am employed as the Coordinator for the Center for Climate Change, Environment, and Energy Law (CCEEL) and I am a member of the Climate Change and International Environmental Law research group from CCEEL. My other research interests include climate justice, environmental justice, and human rights.

Projects

Diet and nutritional status of adolescent girls in Zambézia Province, Mozambique

I'm an Africanist linguist with expertise in spoken and written multilingualism, in particular rural multilingualism. My geographical focus is on Mali, Senegal, Guinea and adjacent regions in West Africa. My current research combines descriptive, sociolinguistic and anthropological perspectives on multilingualism with the goal to develop inclusive and adaptive multilingual educational practices that contribute to reaching the Sustainable Development Goals in the domain of education. This work is reflected in the LILIEMA education programme developed jointly with local activists in Southern Senegal.

I have had a background in International Relations with bachelor's and master's degrees as I wrote my MA thesis on the role of local non-state actors in the integration of refugees. Currently, I am a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Sociology at Middle East Technical University and a visiting doctoral researcher in the Discipline of Global Development Studies at the University of Helsinki. My major research area is the sociology of migration, and my minor is environmental sociology. At the nexus of these two main areas, I have specifically focused on the nexus of the climate crisis, neoliberal governance, and migratory movements along with the urban-rural dynamics, socio-ecological and political-economic transformations in the web of life. In addition to that, I have an interest in decolonial philosophy, which lead me to investigate each phase of climate crisis and migration processes through the relations of power, capital, nature, and coloniality.

Formerly a Postdoc Researcher at the University of Luxembourg and the University of Helsinki (UH) and University Lecturer at UH, Gutu Olana Wayessa is a researcher. His current research is also affiliated with UH. He received BSc from Haramaya University, Ethiopia; an MSc from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Norway; and a Ph.D. in Social Sciences, majoring in Development Studies, from UH, Finland. From 1 February to 31 July 2019, he held a Visiting Research Scholar at the American University, Washington DC, USA. His research interests include displacements and resettlements, climate change, large-scale investments, land governance, environmental and social justice, state-society relations, social movements, and rural livelihoods. His theoretical and methodological interests encompass political ecology, political economy, philosophy of science, and mixed-methods research.

Projects

Large-scale land deals and local livelihoods in Ethiopia: A political ecology of a contested scheme