Dr Amy Fitzmaurice
Conservation Scholar Alumna
- Qualifications B.Sc. Conservation Biology - University of the West of England, UK, 2013 M.Sc. Conservation Science - Imperial College London, UK, 2014 DPhil student WildCRU - Oxford University, UK, ongoing
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Focus area
People Populations
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Location
South Asia
Amy is a DPhil (PhD) researcher from the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit (WildCRU) at Oxford University, working with Chester Zoo to assess interventions at reducing human-wildlife conflict on the Chester Zoo Living with Tigers project, to protect tigers, leopards and people. Her PhD is funded by both Chester Zoo and WildCRU.
“My background is in ecological and social research, studying conservation biology for my undergraduate degree and conservation science for my masters. For my undergraduate degree, I researched the impacts of land use changes on British barn owls in Gloucestershire. For my masters I researched local communities in Borneo, who had not been interviewed before in the area I worked in and the impacts of logging on mammals.
“While working for other organisations I have been involved in developing camera trap data analysis software, and researching the illegal rhino horn trade in Africa and Asia, and human-wildlife conflict in Sierra Leone.
“Although I have been trained as a conservation biologist and have been studying wildlife for my career so far, at heart I am both a zoologist, a conservationist and a social scientist. I believe that successful wildlife conservation must include local people. In any project, both wildlife and people should benefit from changes made for a sustainable future.”
SUPERVISORS
Dr. Alexandra Zimmermann (Chester Zoo)
Professor David Macdonald (WildCRU, University of Oxford)