Emmanuel Kwayu

Postgraduate Student

Telephone number: +44(0) 113 34 35572
Email address: eeejk@leeds.ac.uk
Room: 9.124

Biography

I am a PhD student in the Sustainability Research Institute (SRI) of the School of Earth and Environment (SEE) at the University of Leeds. Before joining SRI in 2009 for PhD, I was coordinating a natural resources management and food security module at the Dar es Salaam University College of Education (DUCE) a constituent college of the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania where I am employed as an assistant lecturer in the Department of Geography.

Qualifications

Before joining DUCE in 2008, I conducted an MA in Geography and Environmental Management (2005-2007) and a BA (Hons.) in Geography and Environmental Studies (2002-2005) both at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania.

Research Interests

My main research interest is on natural resources and environmental economics with a focus on the sustainable use and management of biodiversity and ecosystem services; rural livelihoods and poverty alleviation.

Project details

Project title

The Role of Payments for Ecosystem Services on Poverty Alleviation and Watershed Conservation in Tanzania

Supervisors

Supervisors: Dr Susannah Sallu, Prof Jouni Paavola

Funding

Dar es Salaam University College of Education (DUCE)

Start date

October 2009

Project outline

The focus of my current PhD research project is to examine the payments for ecosystem services (PES) in Tanzania using the equitable payments for watershed services (EPWS) in Morogoro Region as a case study. The interest is to examine the adoption, impacts on the livelihood strategies and assets, distribution of benefits and conservation outcomes. This research was motivated by the widely and increasingly use of PES as a strategy/mechanism to reverse the degradation of ecosystem services and alleviate poverty by transferring funds to providers of these services from beneficiaries. However, these core benefits of PES are prejudicial as there are limited studies on the subject.

To execute this study, the rule based approach, a process based approach and a behavioural approach were employed to examine adoption/participation and conservation outcomes and livelihoods approach to examine impacts on livelihoods assets and strategies.

The preliminary analysis shows a significant adoption of sustainable soil and water conservation practices promoted through PES. These include construction of bench terraces, fanya juu (pack soil up), agro-forestry and tree planting. There are also positive signs of the impact on the livelihood assets and strategies (analysis of findings is on progress).

Publications

Kasthala, Gita, Aloyce Hepelwa, Hamoud Hamiss, Emmanuel Kwayu, Lucy Emerton, Oliver Springate-Baginski, David Allen and Will Darwall 2008 An integrated assessment of the biodiversity, livelihood and economic value of wetlands in Mtanza-Msona Village, Tanzania (IUCN: Gland)