Date/Time
Date(s) - 04/02/2016
15:30 - 16:30
Location
ICCCAD Head Office
Categories
The next instalment of the ICCCAD Seminar Series will take place at 3:30 pm on Thursday, February 4. Naeema Jihan Zinia will be presenting on her doctoral research titled ‘Green Adaptation to Ecosystem Services Management in Dhaka: A Socio-economic Evaluation’
About the seminar
Bangladesh faces multi-dimensional challenges related to, among other issues, population growth, extreme poverty, rapid urbanization, land use change and natural hazards. The severity of these challenges is even more intense given likely climate change. Bangladesh faces acute impacts induced by climate change including: sea level rise, extreme heat, and extreme weather events. Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh, is the hub of economic, social and cultural activities of the country. It is one of the world’s fastest growing mega cities. More than 77% of Dhaka has been urbanized till date. Continuous urban expansion is degrading and drastically reducing natural green and blue spaces and associated ecosystem services that are inevitably affecting the residents’ well-beings. This interdisciplinary study addresses urban ecosystem services assessment, valuation and their nexus with the socio-economic systems. It is novel in that it intends to identify socially acceptable and economically feasible green strategies for managing ecosystem services in an urban setting. The study integrates environmental, economic and social aspects of urban ecosystem services management through quantitative and qualitative evaluation.
About the speaker
Zinia is currently performing doctoral research on green adaptation to ecosystem services management in Dhaka, Bangladesh at the Monash Sustainability Institute (MSI). Her research is of interdisciplinary kind which revolves around the People-Planet-Profit concept. It addresses urban ecosystem services assessment, valuation and their nexus with the socio-economic systems to identify socially acceptable and economically feasible green strategies for managing ecosystem services in an urban setting. She intends to integrate environmental, economic and social aspects of urban ecosystem services management through quantitative and qualitative evaluation.
Prior to starting her doctoral research at the MSI, Zinia worked as a researcher at the Center for Environmental and Geographic Information Services (CEGIS) in Dhaka where she was actively involved in several projects of national and international significance. Her key responsibilities included environmental and economic impact assessment, economic modelling of climate change adaptation strategies, questionnaire design, field visit, data collection by survey and train up surveyors, data analysis, write up project reports and project management. She also has teaching experience at undergraduate levels.
Zinia holds bachelor and master of social sciences degrees in Economics from the University of Dhaka and MSc degree in Urban Environmental Management with specialization in Environmental Systems Analysis from Wageningen University, the Netherlands.
