The James Hutton Institute undertakes research on rural land use and sustainable resource management and has expertise in socioeconomics, land use systems, rural sustainability and biodiversity conservation. Its work is funded by the Scottish Executive and other competitive funding sources.

The Institute has a long history of coordinating multidisciplinary research projects, including projects funded in previous EU Framework Programs and has the infrastructure for this role. The staff work in Africa, Asia and Latin America, as well as Europe. James Hutton institute will co-ordinate the project and will lead the scientific management of the project to ensure that individual work package milestones are met and outputs delivered.

 

 

 

Justin Irvine is a population ecologist who is involved in a number of long-term studies on reindeer (Svalbard) and red deer (Scotland). He is also the Principal Investigator of an RCUK-funded RELU (Rural Economy and Land Use) project that is investigating the role of collaboration amongst stakeholders in managing a natural resource using wild deer management in the UK as a case study. This multidisciplinary project involves social, economic and natural scientists and innovative participatory techniques with stakeholders and policy makers. Irvine has published ~30 papers in refereed journals.

 

 

 

Antonia Eastwood is a botanist and conservationist with experience of working in a wide range of environments, including tropical islands, Balkan grasslands and a range of Scottish habitats. Her work has focussed primarily on the conservation of threatened species and habitats, such as the endemic flora of St Helena and calcareous grasslands in Croatia. She has experience of project management, IUCN Red Listing, conservation planning, capacity building and stakeholder engagement.

 

 

Steve Redpath is Professor of Conservation Biology at the Aberdeen Centre for Environmental Sustainability, a joint centre between the JH and Aberdeen University. He is a Population Ecologist and Conservation Biologist who has worked extensively on raptors and game birds throughout Europe. Redpath co-led the EU Concerted Action REGHAB (Reconciling Game bird Hunting and Biodiversity) and the human-wildlife conflict work package of the RCUK-funded UKPopNET. Redpath has published ~75 papers including in Nature, edited a book on raptor conservation and is an Associate Editor of IBIS.

 

 

 

Anke Fischer has a background in social psychology, environmental sociology and economics. Her work draws on social psychological approaches to understand societal and intra-individual dynamics of public and stakeholders’ values, attitudes and decisions with regard to biodiversity. She has also been working on the institutional analysis of natural resource governance, especially in developing countries. She is currently leading a work package on public attitudes towards biodiversity and conservation within the EU funded Network of Excellence ALTER-NET.

 

 

 

 

Sally Huband is a postdoctoral researcher based in the James Hutton Institute’s Integrated Land Use Systems Team and has a background in conservation, social geography, ecology and social anthropology.

Sally’s research interests centre on understanding the meanings humans attach to nature. Her work currently focuses on investigating the role of culture in influencing farmers’ and crofters’ attitudes towards biodiversity conservation. Prior to joining the James Hutton Institute in 2008, Sally completed an interdisciplinary doctorate (ecology and social anthropology) researching Romanian pastoralism and biodiversity conservation and coordinated an EU funded project on European pastoralism.