Dr. Leah Mungai

As a geographer, my research is understanding human-environment interactions in smallholder farming systems to improve sustainable agriculture. Recently, my interdisciplinary research with the Africa RISING project was aimed to examine Malawi’s agriculture through a multi-scale lens; national, sub-regional and local recognizing the spatial-temporal environmental and social drivers occurring across agro-ecologies and influencing smallholder farmers and their capacity for sustainable food production. Additionally, Land Use Land Cover (LULC) change analysis was done by quantifying agricultural intensification patterns and their underlying landscape processes for evidence of sustainable practices and associated these with Malawi’s agricultural extension delivery system. In this interdisciplinary research I integrate remote sensing and geographic information systems to make better assessments of these spatial –temporal patterns and use our findings to inform scientists, and stakeholders on a systems approach that can assist develop innovative solutions for sustainable agriculture in smallholder farming systems.

My contact: mungaile@msu.edu

Areas of Expertise: Geography and Spatial Sciences, Human-Environment interactions, Remote Sensing, Spatial modeling.