Rachel Dobson

Profile

Working within the Sustainability Research Institute at Leeds, my research broadly aims to explore how climate change will threaten future food security in sub-saharan Africa. My research is funded by the Panorama NERC Doctoral Training Partnership. 

The main focus of my project will be developing statistical models that can predict the movements of migratory and nomadic crop pests, based upon climatic variables and land-use patterns. This understanding can then be used to forecast crop pest distributions under climate change and inform critical management to protect food security. 

Specifically, this study will investigate movements of the African bird, the red-billed quelea (Quelea quelea), which is a serious crop pest that damages staple cereal crops, such as wheat, rice and sorghum. 

Research interests

- Food security

- Climate change impacts

- Conservation biology

Qualifications

• Integrated masters in Biological Sciences (MBiol), Durham University, UK.