My Research

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My research sits at the intersection of climate change, resilience, and development — spanning evidence generation, measurement methodology, and applied policy work across fragile and conflict-affected settings.

CURRENT RESEARCH — WORLD BANK FCV GROUP (2020–PRESENT)

Since joining the World Bank’s Fragility, Conflict and Violence (FCV) Group in 2020, my research has focused on three interconnected areas:

  • Climate finance in fragile settings. I lead the Scaling Adaptation Finance in Fragile Environments (SAFFE) initiative — a global research and knowledge-brokering hub convening policymakers, multilateral development banks, and climate funds to close adaptation-finance gaps in FCV settings. The initiative produced Closing the Gap: Trends in Adaptation Finance in Fragile and Conflict-Affected Settings (2024), used at COP28 and the Fragility Forum to drive evidence-based commitments to FCV-sensitive climate finance.
  • Climate, peace, and fragility linkages. I co-lead an upcoming World Bank Flagship report on the Peace and Social Dividends of Climate Action (due 2026), generating novel evidence on how to deliver effective climate action in conflict-affected settings across eight global case studies. I also lead the FCV Group’s support to Country Climate and Development Reports (CCDRs), including a published Approach Note on integrating FCV considerations into climate diagnostics and ongoing support to 10+ CCDR teams.
  • Compound risk and early warning systems. I developed the Compound Risk Monitor — a real-time dashboard tracking 50+ indicators across climate, conflict, and macro-fiscal risk — to support anticipatory finance decisions. I also coordinated the development of global conflict early warning models integrated into the World Bank’s crisis preparedness diagnostics.

EARLIER RESEARCH — THINK TANK AND ACADEMIC ERA (2010–2020)

Before joining the World Bank, I spent a decade at the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) and the London School of Economics (Grantham Research Institute), where my research focused on:

  • Resilience measurement innovation. My PhD (LSE, 2020) explored novel methods for measuring resilience to climate extremes — including mobile phone panel surveys and subjective (perception-based) evaluation tools — tested through a large-scale study of 1,200 households in Myanmar under the BRACED Rapid Response Research programme. This work produced multiple peer-reviewed publications in Global Environmental Change, Ecology and Society, and WIRES Climate Change.
  • Climate information in decision-making. I led the Future Climate For Africa (FCFA) scoping phase — a £20M interdisciplinary programme coordinating eight research teams to produce decision-relevant climate projections for Africa. Related research examined the constraints and enablers to the uptake of long-term climate information in policy and programming (Nature Climate Change, 2015).
  • Adaptation and resilience programming. I led research and evaluation across the Africa Climate Change Resilience Alliance (ACCRA) programme in Ethiopia, Uganda, and Mozambique, examining how adaptation, disaster risk reduction, and resilience concepts can be operationalised in development programming.

For the full list of publications and working papers, see the Papers page.