Social-Ecological Systems in Transition

Shoko SAKAI (Associate Professor, Research Institute for Humanity and Nature) She started her academic career in botany and ecology. She conducted several research projects on plant reproduction and plant-animal interactions in the tropical forests of Borneo and Panama. In recent years, her interests have broadened to include interactions between ecosystems and human societies. She was an associate professor at Center for Ecological Research, Kyoto University from 2004 to 2008 and started to work at RIHN since 2008. She is a leader of the RIHN project “Collapse and restoration Ecosystem Network under human activity”. She is an coeditor of the book “Pollination ecology and forest canopy: Sarawak studies” published from Springer, NY in 2005. Chieko Umetsu (Professor, Nagasaki University) She received her M.A. from the International University of Japan and Ph.D. degree from the University of Hawaii at Manoa, Honolulu, U.S.A. Her publication includes “Basinwide Water Management: A Spatial Model” in Journal of Environmental Economics and Management (2003) with Ujjayant Chakravorty, and “Efficiency and Technical Change in the Philippine Rice Sector: A Malmquist Total Factor Productivity Analysis” in American Journal of Agricultural Economics (2003) with Thamana Lekprichakul and Ujjayant Chakravorty;“Water Allocation Under Distribution Losses: Comparing Alternative Institutions” in Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control (2009) with Ujjayant Chakravorty, Eithan Hochman and David Zilberman. At RIHN, she was a project leader of “Vulnerability and Resilience of Social-Ecological Systems" and conducts research in drought-prone Southern Zambia.