Integration

Conservation & Sustainability

Advancing multi-disciplinary science across societal and environmental change to maintain the viability and diversity of wild harvests.

We adopt diverse socio-environmental approaches to conservation and sustainability, considering people integral to our systems-based approach.  Our research ranges from development of standards and guidelines to improve our understanding of wild harvests and the full range of ecological services they provide to working with governments and stakeholders to implement strategies derived from this understanding, all within the context of maintaining species viability and supporting biodiversity conservation. We similarly conduct population- and habitat-based studies of harvested species to ensure that harvest goals and environmental conditions are aligned with species requirements and societal needs within government-based objectives. Finally, we support governments and organizations by providing interdisciplinary science to facilitate discourse and policy to further improve sustainable wild harvests and species conservation.

Livelihoods

Understanding how wild harvests support the sustainability of livelihoods, culture, and traditions globally.

Acknowledging that livelihoods encompass economic, social, and cultural dimensions, we draw on interdisciplinary social science approaches to understand the contributions of wild harvests to livelihoods around the world, as well as related drivers and trends. Our research ranges from in-depth qualitative investigations seeking to understand the diversity of livelihoods linked to wild harvests to systematic quantitative assessments of their scope and magnitude. We also offer theoretical and empirical insight into how factors including governance and property rights, conservation, global food systems transformation, and environmental change (e.g., land use, climate) shape wild harvest livelihoods. In this research, we explore the sustainability and equity of wild harvest livelihoods. The goal of this research is to improve standards for tracking livelihood contributions of wild harvests, communicate their importance, and increase understanding for how decision makers can support these livelihoods.

Food Security

Considering wild harvests as integral components of food systems worldwide.

We recognize that wild harvests make important contributions to food and nutritional security for millions of people around the world, and that in some places, these contributions could be expanded. However, there are currently substantial data gaps and lack of standardization, which undermine a more comprehensive understanding of these contributions. To help fill these gaps, our work on this topic includes collaborating with governments and other stakeholders at multiple levels to improve data collection, quantifying food and nutrition value of harvests, and enhancing availability of data on the nutrient content of wild harvested foods. We seek to understand food and nutrition security dimensions of wild harvests across the four pillars of food security: availability, accessibility, stability, and use.

Policy & Governance

Enhancing policy and governance through integration of people and nature.

We recognize that the benefits of sustainable wild harvests are best achieved through transparent governance and policies that consider diverse values. We work alongside communities, organizations, and governments from project inception to completion to ensure that our primary components of conservation and sustainability, food security, and livelihoods are integrated within equally varied concepts of equitability, social justice, gender, economics, and diversity, among others. Together, we help ensure that through these concepts, governance and policy that reflects goals and objectives are achieved. We further provide capacity to evaluate and refine goals using an adaptive management approach to continually improve the role of sustainable use of wild foods in benefitting society.