09:30 – 10:30
Prof. Andrea Ghermandi
Andrea Ghermandi is an Associate Professor at the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management and the director of the Natural Resources and Environmental Research Center at the University of Haifa in Israel. He is an associated editor for the journals Ecosystem Services and PeerJ – The Journal of Life & Environmental Sciences. He is an alumnus of the Global Young Academy. He received a Ph.D. in Analysis and Governance of Sustainable Development from the School for Advanced Studies in Venice Foundation at the University of Venice in Italy in 2008. An environmental engineer by training, his research spans over a range of fields including the valuation and mapping of ecosystem services, the use of research synthesis techniques and crowdsourced digital data in environmental studies, and the technical and economic analysis of ecological engineering and nature-based solutions. Prof. Ghermandi has contributed to high-profile international initiatives such as TEEB-The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity, the UNEP/GEF Project for Ecosystem Services (ProEcoServ), the Ocean Health Index, and the Ecosystem Service Partnership. His research on the use of social media in environmental research was awarded the 2021 Strage-BGU Award for Excellence in Environmental Sciences. He has (co-)authored more than 50 scientific papers in international, peer-reviewed journals in the fields of environmental sciences and environmental economics.