Smart Forests Radio – Details, episodes & analysis

En este episodio de Smart Forests Radio, hablamos con Jorge Saavedra. Jorge es Ingeniero Forestal, Diplomado en Geomática y Tecnología Satelital, Magíster en Teledetección y Jefe del Departamento de Desarrollo e Investigación en Incendios Forestales en la Corporación Nacional Forestal de Chile (CONAF). Jorge cuenta con más de 15 años ligado al Manejo del Fuego, se especializa en áreas como el análisis y planificación, uso de geotecnologías, formación, investigación y desarrollo, evaluación y análisis de riesgo, cuantificación del daño evitado en incendios forestales, abarcando cargos desde brigadista hasta técnico en aviones de detección. También, es profesor adjunto en cursos de pre y postgrado en la Universidad Mayor de Chile. En esta entrevista nos cuenta sobre el rol del Departamento de Desarrollo e Investigación de CONAF, que ha sido analizar de manera transversal a toda la institución para hacer más eficiente el trabajo y entender el por qué del comportamiento del fuego en el territorio chileno. Para esto, han generado diversas herramientas que permiten el monitoreo y prevención a incendios forestales, como el Sistema de Pronóstico, el Mapa de Riesgo Nacional y el Botón Rojo. Puede encontrar más sobre el trabajo de Jorge en https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jorge-Saavedra-15.

Entrevistadora: Pablo González Rivas, Paula Tiara Torres and Jennifer Gabrys

Productor: Harry Murdoch

Imagen: Jorge Saavedra

In this episode of Smart Forests Radio, we talk with Dr Shefali Juneja Lakhina about socially led innovations in fire technology and policy. Shefali is the co-founder of Wonder Labs, a climate justice-focused social enterprise based in California. Since 2021, as part of Wonder Labs’ flagship initiative—the Reimagining 2025: Living with Fire Design Challenge—Shefali has mentored student teams in conducting convergence research with community partners working to reduce catastrophic wildfire impacts in caring, equitable, and just ways. In the interview, Shefali shares insights from Wonder Labs’ State of FireTech Report, emphasising the importance of focusing on “fires that matter” and shifting away from early detection and suppression towards mitigation. She discusses how technology can help different communities prepare to live and work with fire in their unique contexts, providing examples such as BurnBot, a fuel treatment system for prescribed burns, and FireUp, a fire forestry workforce platform.

Interviewer: Jennifer Gabrys

Producer: Harry Murdoch

Image: FireUp

In this Smart Forest Radio episode, we invite Benita Nathania, Mirzha Hanifah (Hani), and Hidayah (Iday) Hamzah from the World Resources Institute (WRI) Indonesia to discuss the use of Global Forest Watch (GFW), an online platform for near real-time forest monitoring in Indonesia. Benita, Hani, and Iday talk about the challenges of utilising GFW in Indonesia. They especially consider complexities related to the diversity of forest definitions and the importance of understanding methodology in interpreting data.

Interviewer: Yuti Ariani Fatimah

Producer: Harry Murdoch

Language note: This interview takes place in Indonesian.

For more on Global Forest Watch, head to Smart Forests Atlas

Image: Nathania et al. (2022), https://wri-indonesia.org/id/publikasi/metode-prioritisasi-peringatan-terkini-perubahan-tutupan-pohon-glad-alert-untuk-berbagai

In this Smart Forests Radio episode, we speak with Pranav Menon, a PhD researcher in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota, about the politics surrounding forest-dwelling communities, forest commons, and digital technologies in India. Pranav focuses on his engagement with the Van Gujjars, a pastoral community experiencing discrimination, on forest claims made through bottom-up mapping practices. Through ethnographic research combined with a handheld GPS eTrex device, he explores ways to generate different imaginations of forest space rooted in pastoralists’ language and life, which can challenge the state’s hierarchisation of land and people. Despite their insurgent possibilities, Pranav also notes that technologies such as GIS might impact the way the pastoral communities perceive and use space, potentially undermining their traditional way of living.

Interviewers: Trishant Simlai and Kate Lewis Hood

Producer: Harry Murdoch

Image: Pranav Menon

In this Smart Forests Radio episode, we are in conversation with Ignacio Barbeito, an Assistant Professor of Silviculture in the Department of Forest Resources Management, at the University of British Columbia. Ignacio discusses how the Climate-Smart Forestry (CSF) approach is transforming forest research practices. He highlights that technologies like tomography, lidar, GIS, and drones are enabling unprecedented ways of seeing forests, providing data such as heartbeat-like growth patterns of trees. As revolutionary as they are, Ignacio also notes that these technologies may blind us with an overwhelming amount of data and incomprehensibly high resolution.

Interviewers: Jennifer Gabrys and Max Ritts

Producer: Harry Murdoch

For more on Clmate-Smart Forestry, head to Smart Forests Atlas

Image: Kamil Kędra and Ignacio Barbeito (2022), https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s41064-022-00201-3

In this Smart Forests Radio episode, we speak with Tom Bewick, former Peru director at Rainforest Foundation US and currently an international project specialist at Nature4Climate. The conversation focuses on the Rainforest Alert, a community forest monitoring system in the Peruvian Amazon that Tom co-developed during his time at the Rainforest Foundation. The Rainforest Alert integrates smartphone technologies, open data deforestation alerts like Global Forest Watch, offline GIS, drones, and satellite imageries to support Indigenous-led monitoring and protection of their territories. Tom discusses how Indigenous communities use the system for their monthly patrols—detecting deforestation activities, patrolling sites, recording evidence, and collectively deciding on a course of action. He also comments on the implications of such a real-time alert system for the intervention process, governance structure, and data ownership.

Interviewers: Kate Lewis Hood and Jennifer Gabrys

Producer: Harry Murdoch

For more on Rainforest Alert, head to Smart Forests Atlas

Image: Rainforest Foundation US, https://rainforestfoundation.org

In this Smart Forests Radio episode, we are in conversation with tree-ring researcher Ute Sass Klaassen at Van Hall Larenstein and Wageningen University & Research, and multi-species geographer Clemens Driessen at Wageningen University & Research. Their research illustrates different more-than-human approaches to engaging with seemingly slower entities like trees and snails by using digital technology. Ute discusses how sensors enable the analysis of the interaction between tree vitality and climate change, such as rate of growth and water transport in stems. To obtain a fuller picture of how trees react to extreme climate events, she explores ways to combine remotely sensed data from drones and satellites with data from tree sensors. Clemens shares an artistic design research project, Unwhorl, developed in collaboration with Mari Bastashevski and Sam Lavinge, which visualises the traces snails leave as they interact with an iPad.

Interviewer: Michelle Westerlaken

Producer: Harry Murdoch

For more on Tweeting Trees and tree-ring research by DendroLab, head to Smart Forests Atlas

Image: Wageningen University & Research, https://www.wur.nl

In this Smart Forests Radio episode, we speak to Dr Douglas Clark, an associate professor at the School of Environment and Sustainability at the University of Saskatchewan. Our conversation revolves around wildlife monitoring technologies and the collaborative process of knowledge production with Northern and Indigenous communities in Arctic Canada. Douglas elaborates on how technologies, when contextualised within local knowledge and conditions, play a crucial role in empowering Indigenous communities to take the lead in scientific research. He emphasises the potential of non-invasive and autonomous technologies, such as remote cameras, drones, and acoustic recording buoys, in researching wildlife and environmental changes in the Arctic.

Interviewers: Trishant Simlai and Max Ritts

Producer: Harry Murdoch

In this Smart Forests Radio episode, we interview Miranda Mesman and Ton de Nijs from the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM). RIVM develops digital platforms like Atlas Natural Capital and Atlas Living Environment to aid green urban planning by quantifying the environmental and societal benefits of greening cities. During the interview, Miranda and Ton share their journey of consolidating maps, building data models, and developing API tools to capture the interdependence of natural capital, the environment, and human health. While digital technologies and data can enable different approaches to modelling urban environments, Miranda and Ton stress that citizen engagement is crucial for realising the benefits of green infrastructures.

Interviewers: Michelle Westerlaken and Jennifer Gabrys

Producer: Harry Murdoch

For more on Atlas Natural Capital, head to Smart Forests Atlas.

In this Smart Forests Radio episode, we speak to Professor David Coomes, Director of the University of Cambridge Conservation Research Institute (UCCRI). David uses computational technologies, from lidar to machine-learning algorithms, to estimate differences in carbon storage over time and across vast landscapes in response to environmental changes. Reflecting on his forest ecology research practice as it intersects with digital technologies, he discusses the importance of maintaining traditional field surveys in the world of high-resolution remote-sensing technologies. David also reminds us that, beyond the monetary value associated with the carbon market, forests have multiple other values, including their role in combating climate change, increasing biodiversity, supporting local livelihoods, and more.

Interviewers: Jennifer Gabrys and Trishant Simlai

Producer: Harry Murdoch