Postdoctoral Research Associate

About the role

Earth Observation (EO) science, data and tools are increasingly critical to supporting policy and societal efforts to reverse the decline in global biodiversity and associated ecosystems. In partnership with other space agencies, ESA is central to this effort through provision of high-quality observation data that form an essential part of the evidence base regarding global change that underpins international, multilateral agreements and treaties including the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Nature Finance is emerging as a key theme addressing the vital need to encourage and support the flow of private and public capital to support actions to address biodiversity and ecosystem sustainability, protection and restoration. While initiatives such as the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosure (TNFD) work towards clear guidance on standards and metrics for use of data related to biodiversity commitments, there is still considerable uncertainty surrounding the suitability of data to address various tasks involving data access, standards, and accuracy, as well as potential untapped opportunities to leverage new and additional EO data. The LEON consortium has formed to work with ESA and address these issues from across the sciences; from across the full breadth of financial services community, EO industry, policymakers, and supply chain actors.

About you

The researcher will work at the centre of the LEON project team, alongside the PI and Co-Is. They will: help bring together the network of collaborating end-users in the finance community to understand EO data and methodology needs; work with technical EO teams to develop metrics, tools and other EO solutions; support efforts to disseminate project findings through LEON project activities; and, co-author scientific publications on the project outputs. The successful candidate will have skills and experience linked both to geospatial analyses/EO data, and to mechanisms relevant to nature finance (e.g. biodiversity credits, footprinting, risk analysis). The candidate will have some experience working with actors outside of academia, ideally in industrial and/or finance sectors.

The researcher will work evenly (exactly 50% FTE in each) across the Nature Positive Hub, and the Global Finance and Economy Group. The Oxford Nature Positive Hub is located in the Department of Biology, bringing together leading researchers from across the University of Oxford, with close collaborators from other organisations. We are united by a common theme: working towards understanding and quantifying the drivers of biodiversity loss, identifying opportunities for impact mitigation and nature gains, and investigating policy mechanisms and actions that might underpin pathways towards Nature Positive outcomes overall. The Global Finance and Economy Group (located in the School of Geography and the Environment) spans natural sciences, economics and finance and aims to increase understanding of the relationships between environmental change, the economy, the financial system, and people, and develop science, analytics, tools, evidence and solutions to secure a resilient, inclusive and sustainable future.

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