EXALT Podcast EXALT Initiative

This month on the EXALT podcast we are super excited to be joined by Xander Dunlap for a precedent-breaking third conversation. Xander is a research fellow at the Institute for Global Sustainability at Boston University and a visiting research fellow at Global Develop Studies at University of Helsinki. Xander talks to us about his new book from Pluto Press, “This System is Killing Us: Land Grabbing, the Green Economy and Ecological Conflict.” This book looks at the last 10 years of work Xander has done in the thick of environmental conflict. Xander unpacks the themes of the book for us and gives us insight into the concept of permanent ecological conflict. Token forms of activism and feel-good activities, which are not unfamiliar to academic circles, are not enough to think past the existing frameworks and modalities that people are living under. This book is an intervention against the mainstreaming or normalization of ecological crises. This conversation covers so many different aspects of the book and Xander’s work. Join us for this impactful insight into why and how “This System is Killing Us.”

Check out Xander’s new book https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745348827/this-system-is-killing-us/ 

Check out Xander’s profiles at Boston University https://www.bu.edu/igs/profile/alexander-dunlap/ and University of Helsinki https://researchportal.helsinki.fi/en/persons/alexander-dunlap 

Find Xander on X (formerly Twitter) @DrX_ADunlap


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In this episode we are joined by Ossi Ollinaho and Máriam Abbas. Ossi is a project researcher from the TreesForDev project leading the work package that is looking at Mozambique. Máriam is a researcher from Observatório do Meio Rural (OMR), in Mozambique, who is coordinating the research line “Environment and Rural Areas”, which explores, among other topics, the impacts of climate change on agriculture, the causes of deforestation and mainstreaming biodiversity in the agricultural sector. 

Ossi and Máriam give us insight into why Mozambique is one of the case study countries in the TreesForDev project. Agriculture accounts for approximately 25 percent of the GDP of the country. Thus, there is a large rural population, and the forest has a very important role in the rural populations’ livelihood prospects. They reflect on the economic system and the underlying extractivist logics that are often incompatible with improving local conditions. 


Want to learn more about the TreesForDev project? www.treesfordev.fi


Want to learn more about our collaborator in Mozambique, Observatório do Meio Rural (OMR)? www.omrmz.org


Want to learn more about Siemenpuu Foundation’s work in Mozambique? https://siemenpuu.org/en/countries/mozambique/ 




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Welcome to the debut episode of the limited series TreesForDev project podcast. In this episode we are honored to be joined by the project principal investigators, Maria Ehrnström-Fuentes and Markus Kröger, from Hanken School of Economics and University of Helsinki respectively. In this conversation, they introduce us to who they are and what types of questions are being investigated in the TreesForDev project. This project examines the dynamics of ecological restoration involving tree planting schemes. Planting trees is a popular and “easy” way to try to restore ecosystems and mitigate climate change. Our project examines the socio-ecological/economic impacts of tree planting in the global South. The project is funded by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs through the Develop2 funding instrument, which is managed in conjunction with the Research Council of Finland. The TreesForDev will run until the end of 2026 and includes research in Finland, Madagascar, Ethiopia, Mozambique, and Brazil.

Want to learn more about the TreesForDev Project? Visit our website at www.treesfordev.fi

Want to learn more about Maria’s work? Please visit her research profile https://www.hanken.fi/en/person/maria-ehrnstrom-fuentes

Want to learn more about Markus’ work? Please visit his research profile https://www.helsinki.fi/en/about-us/people/people-finder/markus-kroger-9091436


This limited series podcast is made possible through funding from the Helsinki Institute of Sustainability Sustainability Science (HELSUS) at the University of Helsinki. If you would like to learn more about HELSUS, please check out their webpage: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/helsinki-institute-sustainability-science




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This month we are overjoyed to be joined by fellow University of Helsinki Global Development Studies doctoral researcher, Martta Kaskien. Martta is currently working with the project Citizenship Utopias in the Global South: The Pursuit of Transformative Alternatives in Times of Civic Disillusionment. Her research is centred on feminist activist narratives in Kenya using ethnographic methods. She gives us insight into her research trajectory and how she got to this topic in this context, and how the COVID-19 pandemic impacted her fieldwork. She gives us insight into how the social pressure from anti-feminist political and public spaces, especially on social media, impact feminist activism and activists. However, even in the face of this pressure she has noticed the prevalence of curated spaces on social media that are created by the feminist activists themselves. These spaces are focused on community building and represent safe spaces for radical feminists to express themselves in the way they wish. These spaces are a form of an everyday utopia and allows these feminists to live life as they would like to today and how they would like to live in the real world  in the future.

If you would like to know more about Martta’s research work, please check out her University profile https://researchportal.helsinki.fi/en/persons/martta-kaskinen 

If you would like to read more about the Citizenship Utopias Project https://blogs.helsinki.fi/citizenshiputopias/ 

Want to check out Eija Ranta’s episode that we refer to? Here is a direct links for your convenience. 

Apple podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/zw/podcast/eija-ranta-when-indigenous-movements-lead-governments/id1499621252?i=1000622609915 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1XUlXgKRWFSUj4jxh6yz3a?si=LbXpbC20SKOccxJoPOLGGw 


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This month we have a deeply interesting conversation with social anthropologist, Dr. Avi KBH, who is a Postdoctoral Researcher in the project Animal Crosslocations, which is resourced through the Resilient and Just Systems (RESET) Network at University of Helsinki. We talked about his new project, “Mosquito Crosslocations and Participatory Evaluations of Mosquito Interventions,” and the trajectory that led him to be interested in these topics. In this conversation we think through the complex web of relationships inherent to multispecies interactions. In particular, he highlighted some of the compelling reasons why we need to shift some of our narratives related to the myriad beings we humans characterize as “pests”. Pests is in quotes because using this language casually brings its own sometimes (often) misguided perceptions and assumptions about the role the being in question plays within the wider web of life.



If you would like to engage with Avi and learn more about the Animal Cross locations project, please visit his blog - https://blogs.helsinki.fi/avibetzh/


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This month we were absolutely delighted to be joined by Joonatan Ala-Könni, for a super interesting conversation that connects natural sciences and extractivisms. Joonatan Ala-Könni is a doctoral researcher in Atmospheric Science at the Institute for Atmospheric and Earth System Research (INAR) at the University of Helsinki. Joonatan’s work is all about climate change and using insights gained from the processes of carbon binding in aquatic environments. The work looks at the physical world – in very basic terms the transport of matter and heat in environments that are water based. His field is called micro-meteorology, which is looking at ecosystems that are no larger than a few hundred meters at the very largest. In the sub-arctic lakes and rivers form a large percentage of the total surface area of the space, thus they become a quite important player in carbon binding. There is surprisingly little data on the role lakes have in binding this carbon. Join us for this conversation to learn more about a natural science view on climate change. 

If you are interested to know more about Joonatan and his work, please check out his university profile https://researchportal.helsinki.fi/en/persons/joonatan-ala-k%C3%B6nni


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