Integrating weather and climate data to design effective, people-centred wildfire early warning systems in Latin America

Year: 2025
Primary Supervisor: Carina Fearnley <c.fearnley@ucl.ac.uk>
Institution: University College London (Science and Technology Studies)
Academic Supervisors: Shipra Jain <shipra.jain@ucl.ac.uk> (University College London, Department of Risk and Disaster Reduction)
Project Partners: Practical Action

Background

Wildfires can often go undetected until they have spread significantly, making them harder to control, causing widespread loss of life and damage. This challenge is further pronounced in Global South countries, where financial and technical resources are constrained, limiting capacities to invest in proactive preparedness measures. For populations that rely heavily on agriculture and forests for their livelihoods, the impacts of wildfires can be devastating, resulting in significant losses and damage to primary sources of income as well as food and fuel.

There have been rapid advancements in wildfire EWS in the Global North in recent years, as well as significant losses and “failures”. Wildfire risks in Global South contexts are rising and will continue to increase as the climate changes. We need to learn from existing practices and improve EWS for wildfire in these Global South contexts, considering all elements of the Early Warning System (risk knowledge, monitoring and warning, dissemination and communication, and response capability) to ensure systems are resilience to climate change and provide the most vulnerable people the right information at the right time to take early action and avoid or reduce losses.

Such an approach needs to be trans-disciplinary, bringing together high-tech, cutting-edge physical science and technology, using satellite data, citizen-science approaches and GIS mapping, as well as social science, addressing issues of gender, equity and social inequality, with a focus on practical implementation in Global South contexts, including considerations of indigenous knowledge and practices, participatory design, and equitable access to risk-informed decision-making in the face of uncertainty.

PhD opportunity

This doctoral project will work with collaborative partner Practical Action to bring together science and technology studies (STS) to explore how to design and implement wildfire Early Warning Systems in Global South contexts.

In line with UNRISK’s objectives, this research focuses on bringing together hazard / climate / data science, social science, and decision-making within the context of wildfire EWS. Key research questions include: What EWS are in place for wildfire hazards globally and how effective are they? How can the current early warning systems in Latin America be enhanced to include wildfires? How can existing practices inform the development of effective EWS for wildfire events globally?

The PhD candidate will develop a guide to designing and implementing wildfire EWS in Global South contexts, with a specific focus on Latin America (with case studies in Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador). The project will be highly transdisciplinary, working across the physical sciences, social sciences, and practice, using a range of quantitative and qualitative research methodologies.

Working with wildfire EWS experts and operators in Australia, USA, and Europe, the candidate will be able to learn from existing programmes and cutting-edge research. The candidate will work with staff and partners from Practical Action to understand local context in Latin America, to support and facilitate learning across geographies. The candidate will identify strategies to overcome barriers faced by Global South practitioners and policy makers, developing a realistic conceptual framework or process for developing and implementing wildfire EWS in Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador. Case studies for assessing spatio-temporal wildfire risk will be explored.

This provides the opportunity to work with two world-leading Early Warning System entities across the academic and practitioner sectors – the UCL Warning Research Centre and Practical Action. The candidate will also benefit from interdisciplinary training through the UNRISK network, collaborating with experts at UCL, University of Leeds, and University of Exeter to advance the management of hazard uncertainty and risk. This research aims to enhance academic understanding whilst providing engagement with global practices currently implemented for warnings, positioning the PhD candidate as a leader in wildfire EWS.

Other information

Applicant profile: Students with a strong interest in hazard uncertainty and risks, ideally with a wildfire or GIS background, who want to work across the physical and social sciences using qualitative and quantitative data are desirable. Essential requirements is for candidate to speak both English and Spanish, desirable would be work experience in Global South contexts.