Congratulations to Dr. Vinay Kamat, who has received a SSHRC Partnership Engage Grant for the project Mitigating the Impacts of Climate Change on Fisheries-dependent Communities in Coastal Southeastern Tanzania.
This is a partnership project between UBC and Spring of Health and Environmental Management Organization (SHEMO), a non-profit environmental NGO based in Mtwara, southeastern Tanzania. SHEMO was established in June 2021 by faculty and former students of the Stella Maris Mtwara University Collage (St. Augustine University of Tanzania), with a broad mandate “to improve people’s health and manage environment of the community through education, research and responsive services.”
The project will document how people living in fisheries-dependent communities in coastal Mtwara are integrating the material and discursive aspects of climate change into their daily lives and cultural practices. The knowledge mobilized through this study will be used to design appropriate interventions to mitigate the impacts of climate change on coastal communities in rural Mtwara.
The project draws on anthropological and interdisciplinary scholarship regarding the human dimensions of climate change. It will help SHEMO to collaborate with local communities and undertake more effective and sustainable interventions aimed at minimizing the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation on local fisheries-dependent communities. The project reflects SSHRC’s and UBC’s mandate to promote community-engaged scholarship.
