Puff Ray Mukwaya is a PhD student at the University of Edinburgh’s College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine and its Global Academy of Agriculture and Food Systems. After completing his bachelor’s degree in veterinary medicine from Makerere University, Puff pursued a master’s degree in Agribusiness from the same university, gaining knowledge and skills in socio-economic and climate change impact assessments.
With a background in humanitarian and development work in fragile settings and pastoral communities, he brings experience in data and economic modelling to enhance decision-making processes for food security and climate change actions, to provide insights into the impact of anticipatory actions in vulnerable pastoral communities of East Africa.
He previously worked with VSO in Uganda, Tanzania and Bangladesh and Vetwork Services Trust and Land O’Lakes in South Sudan where he led livestock development projects. His last assignment was with a multi-faceted European Union funded project implemented by ATTA (AgritechTalk-Africa), ACTED and the Ministry of Water and Environment that aimed to enable Uganda to accurately estimate GHG emission from the livestock sector, reduce its impacts on the environment, and advance evidence-based livestock management practices in adapting to and mitigating climate change impacts.
Research focus and plans
Puff’s research will establish an economic basis for anticipatory actions on food security in vulnerable communities of East Africa. He will use risk prediction and economic modelling methodologies to investigate the cost-effectiveness of responding to predicted food security emergencies. Such forecast-based action, which uses meteorological forecasts, price data, and satellite-based livestock production models to project the likelihood of weather-related distress, can be used to identify poor conditions, trigger aid earlier, and allow households to avoid harmful coping strategies.
More generally, he will explore linkages between emerging predictive technologies for food security, disasters and anticipatory and climate change actions.
Jameel Observatory significance
Supervised by Professors Dominic Moran and Geoff Simm of the University’s Global Academy for Agriculture and Food Systems, Puff’s research will leverage existing work on predictive technologies by early warning systems to examine how ex-ante appraisal of drought emergency interventions can best guide and enhance food security interventions. It will also help to simplify the complexity of the nexus of climate change adaptation and anticipatory actions in pastoral communities of East Africa.
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