Almost half the world’s population cooks with highly polluting, traditional biomass stoves that burn wood or crop residue. The resulting household air pollution is one of the world’s leading causes of death and contributes significantly to climate change.

I am a PhD candidate in the Environmental Applied Science and Management program at Ryerson University. I am interested in approaches that will help software developers design products that meet customers' needs, require less energy to produce, are longer lasting, and can be safely and responsibly disposed. I am studying the interrelationships between product quality and sustainability and I’m enthusiastic about finding and removing their boundaries so that software developers aren't afraid to be more sustainable.

Adam is the brains behind the Eden Project, a unique social enterprise with a mission to offer local, organic produce at competitive prices.

“Global food systems are changing due to a variety of stressors, and food prices are climbing. We believe that urban agriculture and locally-grown food will play an important role in future food supplies as our societies adapt to these changes,” he explains.

A seed was planted

Her friend and colleague, Amber Jarvinen, approached her about the possibility of using bacteria to clean up oil and chemical spills. Amber had founded a small environmental start-up and was looking for a partner with expertise in environmental biology.

The big launch

The temperature was 46 degrees for almost the entire first two weeks here, and I’m quite sure to have lost ten pounds in that time. Luckily, Hanoi is one of the great street food capitals of the world, where you can get a tasty bowl of Bún chả famous to the city, with freshly grilled meats in it for $1 or $2 and gain back any of that lost summer weight.

It’s been a whirlwind of new experiences since I arrived in Vietnam two months ago. I am here to study seahorses, both underwater and those that are caught by fishing boats. It’s the field portion of my MSc degree, which I am completing at the University of British Columbia Fisheries Centre, co-supervised by Drs. Amanda Vincent and Sarah Foster. My lab, Project Seahorse, conducts research all over the world, with a focus on Southeast Asia. My work is strengthening ties between Canada and Vietnam, and helps work towards greater conservation for seahorses.

More than 400,000 fishers, belonging to specific fisher castes, customarily depend upon the lagoon for their livelihoods. For my research project, which was based on Khirisahi Island, I analysed how they perceive and adapt to environmental changes.

Issues surrounding resources and sustainability, like water in developing countries, often require an interdisciplinary approach. Challenges related to water access are much more severe than in developed countries, due to factors such as rapid population growth, inadequate infrastructure, and lack of robust resource management policies. Compounding these challenges is an absence of appropriate theories and tools for knowledge integration to bridge the gap between resource management and research.

Mitacs thanks the Government of Canada and the Government of Ontario for their support of the Accelerate research internship in this story. Across Canada, the Accelerate program also receives support from Alberta Innovates, the Government of British Columbia, the Government of New Brunswick, the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, the Government of Nova Scotia, the Government of Prince Edward Island, the Government of Quebec, the Government of Saskatchewan  and Research Manitoba.