Climate change, population growth and movement, cost of living pressures, animal welfare, seed monopolies, supply chain shortages, consumption and health… the list of challenges around food seems endless. Yet there is much thoughtful and positive work taking place to improve the health and sustainability of our food systems worldwide.

In this four-part seminar series, presented in partnership with All of Life Redeemed, an international platform of researchers will speak on their work in this area from a range of perspectives that ‘use research to do good for all’.

This event: Friday 20th May

Dr Yoseph Araya
Climate-smart agroforestry in Malawi

“Among many challenges facing our planet, the three that often come to the fore are biodiversity loss, impending climate change and loss of food security. In this context, recently, there has been a growing recognition of smallholder farmers’ contributions to addressing these key global environmental and social development issues in innovative ways. In this example I will discuss a case study of climate-smart macadamia agroforestry, as practised by a smallholder cooperative in Malawi.”

Dr Araya is Senior Lecturer in Ecology and Environmental Sciences, The Open University. His research focuses on the functional relationships between plants and their environment, especially concerning water and nutrient dynamics.

Dr Richard Gunton
How broad is sustainable intensification?

“Sustainable intensification (SI) is a slippery term that means something like increasing food production while reducing environmental damage from farming. But there are many ideas about what counts as increasing food production and what “reducing environmental damage” means: it depends whom you ask. In this talk I will apply a pluralistic evaluation framework to explore the possible diversity of flavours of SI. I will suggest how these options can be understood using the concept of modes of valuing, and consider how ideological divergence among people and cultures may illuminate and also frustrate the application of SI in practice.”

Richard is Lecturer in Statistics at the University of Winchester, where he also teaches a module on The Values of Nature. His research ranges around environmental ethics, policy evaluation, and philosophy of the sciences.

The full series

Seminar details

The seminars take place on consecutive Fridays, from 12:00-14:00 BST, on Zoom. You are welcome to attend the whole series, but each lecture will stand alone.

Places are £5 per seminar, free for students.

Full joining details will be sent when you book.