Aster Gebrekirstos

Last updated
Aster Gebrekirstos
Born
Aster Afwork Gebrekirstos

Shire, Tigray, Ethiopia
Alma mater
Known forEstablishment of the Dendrochronology Laboratory, Ethiopia
Awards
  • African Climate Award
  • Special Award for Ground Breaking Science
Scientific career
Fields
Institutions

Aster Afwork Gebrekirstos FAAS TWAS is an Ethiopian scientist and a professor of agroforestry at World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF).

Contents

Early life and education

Aster Gebrekirstos was born in Shire, Tigray, Ethiopia as the first child of a family of seven. She had the intention of becoming a doctor but her high school results did not qualify her for the profession and she had to choose between teaching and forestry and she chose the latter. [1] [2]

She obtained a Bachelor of Science in Forestry from the Haramaya University. She stayed at the Haramaya University as a graduate assistant immediately after her bachelor's degree before winning the Netherland Fellowship and complete a Master of Science at Wageningen University & Research (1996–1998). She took a lectureship position at Wondo Genet College of Forestry, Hawassa University. [3]

She was awarded German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) scholarship to do a Doctor of Philosophy at Gottingen University in Germany (2001–2005). After her Ph.D., she joined as a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Biophysics and Biochemistry, Umeå University, Sweden (2006–2008) before going to ICRAF, Kenya and Göttingen University, Germany (2009–2011). [4]

Career and research

As a dendrochronologist, she established dendrochronology laboratory in Ethiopia in 2009, the dendrochronology laboratory at Wondo Genet College of Forestry and Natural Resources in 2010, and the World Agroforestry Centre's dendrochronology laboratory in Kenya in 2013. [5] [6]

Her research focuses on Dendroisotopy, [7] [8] climate change, [9] [10] plant-water relations, [11] [12] and social forestry. [13] Gebrekirstos is a visiting professor at the West African Science Service Center on Climate Change, Adapted Land Use (WASCAL) program, Dresden University of Applied Sciences, Centre for International Postgraduate Studies of Environmental Management (CIPSEM). [4] [14] [15] She is serving as the Chair of the Environment Committee African Academy of Sciences and Deputy coordinator of IUFRO Task Force on Global Tree Mortality Patterns and Trends, Mountain Research Institute Science Leadership Council. [16] [17] [18]

Awards and recognitions

She was elected a Fellow of the African Academy of Sciences in 2017. [5]

Fellow of the World Academy of Sciences in 2021. [14]

Fellow of the International Academy of Wood Sciences in 2021. [17] [18]

In 2014, she was awarded the African Climate Award for Excellence Research in climate adaptation and mitigation. She is also the Winner of the 2019 Special Award for Ground Breaking Science; an African-wide Young Professionals and Women in Science Competitions that was organized by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation ACP-EU (CTA), African Technology Policy Studies (ATPS), Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM), and the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD). [5] [14] [15]

Selected publications

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Forestry</span> Science and craft of managing woodlands

Forestry is the science and craft of creating, managing, planting, using, conserving and repairing forests and woodlands for associated resources for human and environmental benefits. Forestry is practiced in plantations and natural stands. The science of forestry has elements that belong to the biological, physical, social, political and managerial sciences. Forest management plays an essential role in the creation and modification of habitats and affects ecosystem services provisioning.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Reforestation</span> Method for land and forest regeneration

Reforestation is the practice of restoring previously existing forests and woodlands that have been destroyed or damaged. The prior forest destruction might have happened through deforestation, clearcutting or wildfires. Three important purposes of reforestation programs are for harvesting of wood, for climate change mitigation, and for ecosystem and habitat restoration purposes. One method of reforestation is to establish tree plantations, also called plantation forests. They cover about 131 million ha worldwide, which is 3% of the global forest area and 45% of the total area of planted forests.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Center for International Forestry Research</span>

The Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) is a non-profit scientific research organization that conducts research on the use and management of forests with a focus on tropical forests in developing countries. CIFOR, which merged with World Agroforestry on Jan. 1, 2019, is the forestry and agroforestry research center of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), a network of 15 research centers around the world that focus on agricultural research for sustainable development, working closely with governments and other partners to help develop evidence-based solutions to problems related to sustainable agriculture and natural resource management.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Agroforestry</span> Land use management system

Agroforestry is a land use management system that integrates trees with crops or pasture. It combines agricultural and forestry technologies. As a polyculture system, an agroforestry system can produce timber and wood products, fruits, nuts, other edible plant products, edible mushrooms, medicinal plants, ornamental plants, animals and animal products, and other products from both domesticated and wild species.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wondo Genet</span> Resort town in Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples Region, Ethiopia

Wondo Genet is a resort town in Ethiopia located southeast of Shashemene in the Sidama Region with an elevation of 1723 meters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Haramaya University</span> University in Haramaya, Oromia Region, Ethiopia

Haramaya University (HU) is a public research university in Haramaya, Oromia Region, Ethiopia. It is approximately 510 kilometres (320 mi) east of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The Ministry of Science and Higher Education admits qualified students to Haramaya University based on their score on the Ethiopian Higher Education Entrance Examination (EHEEE).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Union of Forest Research Organizations</span>

The International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO) is a non-profit, non-governmental international network of forest scientists, headquartered in Austria. In 2019, IUFRO counted 630 Member Organizations worldwide.

World Agroforestry is an international institute headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya, and founded in 1978 as "International Council for Research in Agroforestry". The centre specializes in the sustainable management, protection and regulation of tropical rainforest and natural reserves. It is one of 15 agricultural research centres which makes up the global network known as the CGIAR.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Social forestry in India</span> Forestry intended to help environmental, social, and rural development

Social forestry is the management and protection of forests and afforestation of barren and deforested lands with the purpose of helping environmental, social and rural development. The term social forestry was first used in 1976 by The National Commission on Agriculture, when the government of India aimed to reduce pressure on forests by planting trees on all unused and fallow lands. It was intended as a democratic approach to forest conservation and usage, maximizing land utilization for multiple purposes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Farm Forestry Toolbox</span>

The Farm Forestry Toolbox is a collection of computer programs, referred to as 'Tools', intended to be used by farm forest owners and managers to aid decision making. The Toolbox includes a set of simple 'Hand Tools'; conversion of measurements and map co-ordinates; measuring the volume of stacked logs, slope, basal area; and a survey tool. A second set of more complex tools or 'Power Tools'; can be used to estimate site productivity, volume and value of wood grown for individual trees, at the coupe or stand level and forest estate level.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Victoria Basin forest–savanna mosaic</span>

The Victoria Basin forest–grassland mosaic is an ecoregion that lies mostly in Uganda and extends into neighboring countries. The ecoregion is centered north and west of Lake Victoria, with an outlier on the border of Ethiopia and South Sudan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">P. K. Ramachandran Nair</span>

P. K. Ramachandran Nair is an Indian American agricultural scientist, Distinguished Professor of Agroforestry and International Forestry at the School of Forest, Fisheries, and Geomatics Sciences (SFFGS), Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS), University of Florida. He is known for his pioneering contributions to the science of agroforestry, for which he received global recognition including the Humboldt Prize (2006). The specific areas of his research include agroforestry in the tropics and subtropics, integrated farming systems, soil carbon sequestration and climate change mitigation, ecosystem services, and soil fertility management. He has written over 200 peer-reviewed articles, 17 books and over 80 book chapters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wanjira Mathai</span> Kenyan environmentalist (born 1971)

Wanjira Mathai is a Kenyan environmentalist and activist. She is Managing Director for Africa and Global Partnerships at the World Resources Institute, based in Nairobi, Kenya. In this role, she takes on global issues including deforestation and energy access. She was selected as one of the 100 Most Influential Africans by New African magazine in 2018 for her role serving as the senior advisor at the World Resources Institute, as well as for her campaign to plant more than 30 million trees through her work at the Green Belt Movement.

The National Agroforestry Policy of India is a comprehensive policy framework designed to improve agricultural livelihoods by maximizing agricultural productivity for mitigating climate change. The Government of India launched the policy in February 2014 during the World Congress on Agroforestry, held in Delhi. India became the first country in the world to adopt an agroforestry policy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Church forests of Ethiopia</span> Protected sacred forests around rural churches

The church forests in Ethiopia are small fragments of forest surrounding Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Churches. Northern Ethiopia was once covered in forests, but due to deforestation for agriculture, only about 4% of the original forested lands remain. Church leaders have long held the belief that a church needs to be surrounded by a forest, and these sacred forests have been tended for some 1,500 years. Aerial photographs of church forests show them as small verdant islands surrounded by vast areas of tilled lands and pasture. There are around 35,000 individual church forests in the region, ranging in size from 3 hectares to 300 hectares, with the average around 5 hectares. It is estimated that these church forests represent the bulk of the remaining forested land in the Ethiopian Highlands.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Higher education in Ethiopia</span>

Higher education in Ethiopia has been improving in quality, standard, relevance, and academic freedom. Despite an expansion of private higher education and rising enrollment, the quality of education they render is still under question. Higher education supposed originated by Saint Yared music school in the sixth century in line with centuries old traditional education of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. Modern higher education was commenced during the reign of Emperor Haile Selassie with the establishment of the University College of Addis Ababa, now called Addis Ababa University, in 1950. It then followed by Haramaya University and Ambo school of agriculture, today's Ambo Univeristy. By this time, there were only three secondary schools in the country, used as preparatory for college entrance.

The Ethiopian Academy of Sciences is a national academy founded on April 10, 2010. Pediatrician Demissie Habte served as its inaugural president. The founding class of fellows included 50 people across the natural and social sciences. It was started by researchers from Addis Ababa University with support from the Royal Society until 2011. Its founding executive director is plant ecophysiologist Masresha Fetene. Brhane Gebrekidan, an agronomist, is vice president. By 2022, only 9 percent of its fellows were women, the smallest percentage among academies in Africa. It is a member of the Network of African Science Academies.

Masresha FeteneFAAS is an Ethiopian professor of Plant Ecophysiology at the Department of Plant Biology and Biodiversity Management, Addis Ababa University.

References

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