Who we are

Victoria Reyes-García

(Ph.D. in Anthropology, 2001, University of Florida) is ICREA Research Professor at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology (ICTA), Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), Principal Investigator of the LICCI and director of the LICCION project. Her research addresses the benefits generated by local ecological knowledge and the effects of the integration to the market economy on this type of knowledge. Reyes-García lived among the Tsimane’, an indigenous population in the Bolivian Amazon, from 1999 until 2004. Between 2010-15, she coordinated a European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant to study the adaptive nature of culture using a cross-cultural approach. The LICCI project is under an ERC Consolidator Grant and will assess the potential contribution of indigenous and local knowledge systems to climate change impacts research.

Adrien Tofighi-Niaki

(M.Sc. in International Development, University of Amsterdam) Adrien Tofighi-Niaki is a systematic and mindful strategist in environmental and climate change justice. He has worked in environmental law, mobilization of land and human rights resources and tools via Project HEARD, and assessing Paris-alignment and fossil fuel financing impacts on lower-middle-income countries. Adrien is coordinating LICCION with Indigenous peoples and local community representatives and civil society organizations, as well as coordinating workshops with facilitators and integrating feedback into Oblo. He is active in various human rights and climate change networks and speaks English, French, and Spanish.

Ramin Soleymani

(M.Sc. in Computer Science, 2010, University of Hannover) is the software engineer in the LICCI and LICCION team at ICTA-UAB. He has worked in research on developing planning strategies for wireless sensor networks at the University Duisburg-Essen and worked as a Creative Technologist at the Berlin-based Service Design Agency IXDS. He also worked as a freelance software developer, educator, and artistic researcher and has been a community organizer for a digital art community in Berlin and in Barcelona. He was also an initiator and co-organizer of Science Hack Day Berlin, a community-run Hackathon for Citizen Science and Do-It-Yourself (DIY) Science. Within the LICCION project he is in charge of developing Oblo.

Petra Benyei

(Ph.D. in Environmental Sciences, ICTA-UAB) is a sociologist and expert in rural development researching on the use of citizen science tools to document, share, and protect traditional agroecological knowledge. She has worked in projects related to the evaluation of the South African land reform (PSGARD, Pretoria) and projects related to climate change mitigation strategies in rural Spain (Paris Diderot University). She has also participated actively in the design, implementation, dissemination, and analysis of CONECT-e, a Wiki-based platform focused on documenting traditional ecological knowledge in Spain. In the LICCI project, she will be investigating the perceived impacts of climate change in both mountain and urban agroecosystems. In the LICCION project, she will be investigating the process of transformation of a citizen science platform (OpenTEK) to increase its potential as a tool to make climate research/policy more inclusive and equitable.

Vincent Porcher

(M.Sc. in Tropical Botany and Ethnoecology, 2017, University of Montpellier & AgroParisTech and M.Eng. in Agronomy in Southern Countries, 2017, Agrocampus-Ouest & University of Curitiba) is a Predoctoral Research Fellow of the LICCI team at ICTA-UAB. During his master’s degree, he worked on the ecology and regeneration of Brazil nut (Bertholletia excelsa) in Peru (Bioversity International, CGIAR). He is actively involved in the accessibility of science, and has published a field guide for local populations in terms of identifying Brazil nut seedlings. He is particularly concerned about the resilience of Indigenous Peoples and local communities to crises. Vincent is also our in-house photographer.

Carla Lanyon Garrido

Carla Lanyon Garrido (M.Sc. in Social-Ecological Resilience for sustainable development, Stockholm University) is a natural resource engineer at Chile University, specialized in rural and indigenous communities, knowledge co-production, and transdisciplinary research. During her master’s, Carla’s research focused on integrating Indigenous knowledge from Sami communities into the land-use discussion in Sweden through a biocultural and decolonial understanding of landscape. Her research interest includes biocultural diversity, local resilience, social-ecological system, and decolonial approach.

Pasang Dolma Sherpa

Pasang Dolma Sherpa, Executive Director of CIPRED in Nepal, has been working with Indigenous Peoples, Women and Local Communities for the recognition of the indigenous peoples’ knowledge, cultural values and customary institutions that contribute for sustainable management of forest, ecosystem, biodiversity and climate resilience for more than a decade. Ms. Sherpa has obtained her PhD at Kathmandu University in 2018 on Climate Change Education and its Interfaces with Indigenous Knowledge. She has served as Co-Chair of International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum on Climate Change (IIPFCC), Co-Chair of Facilitative Working Group (FWG) of Local Communities and Indigenous Peoples’ Platform (LCIPP) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC ), to the board of UN-REDD, Participant Committee of FCPF, World Bank. Presently, she is the member of FWG, LCIPP of UNFCCC and Chair of Specialist Group on Indigenous Peoples’ Customary and Environmental Laws and Human Rights (SPICEH) of CEESP-IUCN, visiting faculty at Kathmandu University as well as representing in different forums, networks and institutions both at national and international levels.

Preity Gurung

[BIO PENDING]

Kittisak Rattanakrajangsri

Kittisak is the current Executive Director of IPF in Thailand. He has worked to promote and advocate for indigenous peoples’ issues since 1989 particularly on land and natural resource management rights. He has also had experience in supporting communities on conducting climate change assessment and developed community adaptation plans. His organization (IPF) is a partner of the LICCION initiative.

Kanjana Maran

(B.B.A. in Business Information Technology, Maejo University) Kanjana is the Admin officer of IPF in Thailand. She has worked to promote and advocate for Indigenous peoples’ issues for a long time particularly on alternative education, land, and natural resource management rights. She has also had experience in supporting communities in conducting climate change assessments and developing community adaptation plans and producing various learning materials to promote Indigenous peoples’ knowledge through social media platforms.  

Vu Thi Hien

Vu Thi Hien is the Director of CERDA in Vietnam. She graduated in Hanoi Agriculture University and completed Master Degree on Animal Genetics in Sydney University, Australia. She was a researcher and lecturer on Animal Genetics in Hanoi, Agricultural University for 22 years. Later, she moved to work for international NGOs and worked as a consultant for World Bank, international NGOs and government agencies in Vietnam. She is experienced in the field of Development, especially regarding Climate Change. In 2004, she established CERDA and works as a director of many projects in different fields, especially with a focus on REDD+. She is also an experienced trainer/facilitator and dedicated to work with vulnerable groups, especially ethnic minorities in Vietnam for almost 20 years.