PhD Scholarships - Ghana, Malaysia, South Africa and Tanzania

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We are hiring a cohort of PhD students to join a specially curated Doctoral Training Programme (DTP) as part of FoodE International consortium and a project on ‘Shaping food environments in transitioning economies for sustainable and healthy diets’. The project aims to establish a shared understanding of problems and opportunities to develop solutions to shape food environments in four different transitioning economies to drive nutritious and safe food consumption for better health outcomes.

The project will utilise a variety of approaches to study dietary habits, consumer and food supply trends and policies to develop evidence-based policy recommendations for various stakeholders and sectors to transform food environments and consumption patterns, targeting poor urban communities in all partner countries.

The DTP students will be part of a transdisciplinary team of international researchers studying food environments. Successful applicants are expected to be based in at least one of the consortium member countries (Ghana, Malaysia, South Africa and Tanzania) and have local knowledge and experience.

Main research areas but not limited to

• Analysis and mapping of personal food environments and nutritional status of the urban poor (micro level)
• Analysis and mapping of urban food environments (meso level)
• Analysis and mapping local/regional urban food value chain and food systems (meso level)
• Food policy analysis and design and political decision-making processes (local/regional) for sustainable and healthy diets (macro level)
• Business model innovations for sustainable and healthy diets
• Food systems dynamic modelling in the context of climate change and other risks (e.g. food safety, COVID-19 )
• Consumer behaviour models for sustainable and healthy diets

Requirements

• Master’s degree in geography (food/nutritional geography; geospatial analysis), epidemiology, public health, public health nutrition, nutrition, consumer and behavioural sciences, agricultural and/or food economics, agricultural and food sciences, sociology, public policy or any other relevant fields. Outstanding candidates without Masters Degree, but with a First Class Degree in relevant field, will be considered.
• Demonstrated research skills in experimental design, data collection, management and analysis
• Ability to communicate in English (proof of language skills will be required) and one local language
• Ability to work in a team and in different environments
• Willingness to travel locally and to other partner countries for research and learning
• Excellent writing skills; evidence of previous publications will be considered an advantage

Scholarship awards will cover fees and stipend for three (3) years. The amount will depend on the individual institution, and budgetary arrangements and details will be discussed and agreed upon with successful candidates. Interested individuals are kindly invited to send their CV and a one-page cover letter (letter of motivation) by Monday 31 July 2023 to:

director@csir-stepri.org (Ghana)
festo.massawe@nottingham.edu.my (Malaysia)
MkhizeN34@ukzn.ac.za (South Africa)
jkinabo@sua.ac.tz or akwmwanri@sua.ac.tz (Tanzania)

Closing date: Monday, 31 July 2023