PhD Biomass for Biodiesel Production on Family Farms in Minas Gerais

The rapid development of the bio-energy market and recent Brazilian policies provide incentives for production of biodiesel sourcing feedstock from family farms. Feedstock includes soybean, sunflower, groundnut, castor and jatropha each with its own requirements for cultivation and processing. When exported, biodiesel will need to comply with internationally agreed sustainability criteria. Climate change policies may add economic incentives for sustainable production such as payments related to the clean development mechanism and carbon credits. The response of farm households to market opportunities and policy incentives, the impact of these responses on sustainability at farm level, on farm configuration and on the type of farm to biofuel business relations have high relevance to policy makers and other stakeholders. The various interrelated effects require an integrated assessment. The PhD will develop bio-economic farm models based on a farm typology including farm characteristics and organisation models linking farms to commercial enterprises. These models will be used to assess the effect of market developments, policy changes and technological innovations on economic and environmental sustainability of specific categories of farm systems. Risk and uncertainties about weather, price, policy and market changes, the potential of farmer organisations to cope with these, and their impact on farm survival and farm innovation will be included in the assessment. Regional implications will be explored by aggregating farm level responses to the Minas Gerais state.

The candidate has completed an MSc in a relevant field (e.g. Plant Sciences, Agronomy, Biology, Resource Ecology, Economy). He/she have proven capabilities in systems analysis, simulation modeling and other quantitative methods, has experience with literature research, computer programming languages and data searching., is fluent in English and Portuguese and has good writing skills. The candidate is able to communicate well with colleague researchers in similar and other relevant disciplines.

Additional information about the job:
Federal University of Visçosa, Department of Agronomy.
Wageningen University, Department of Plant Sciences, chair group Plant Production Systems.
Wageningen University, Department of Social sciences, chair group Management Studies

The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) has through its organisation Science for Global Development (WOTRO) granted funding for an integrated programme ‘Biomass for fuel: opportunity or threat to food and feed security? Case studies for farms in Brazil and Mozambique’. The programme seeks to assess the possibilities and limitations of biomass for bio-fuel production on family farms in two regions in Mozambique and Brazil by exploring pros and cons of alternative farming options. It aims at developing generic methods, such that they can be applied to the regions in Mozambique and Brazil, but are also re-usable for other regions where similar issues are at stake.
The main research partners in the programme are different groups of Wageningen University, the Netherlands, University of Sao Paolo and Federal University of Viçosa, both in Brazil, and Eduardo Mondlane University, Mozambique National Institute of Agricultural Research (IIAM) and International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), all three based in Mozambique. The programme includes two post-docs, one in the Netherlands and one in Brazil, and two PhD students, one in Mozambique and one in Brazil. The research will be carried out in close collaboration between the countries. The programme is managed and coordinated by the chair group Plant Production Systems (PPS) at Wageningen University.

Information: For more information on the vacancy you can contact Prof. L.C. Costa, l.costa@ufv.br, Dr. M.A. Slingerland, maja.slingerland@wur.nl, Dr J. Bijman, jos.bijman@wur.nl.

Information on Sandwich PhD-requirements is available on the website of the research school PE&RC: www.dpw.wageningen-ur.nl/PEenRC/. Information on the type of research is available at the website www.competingclaims.nl.

Wageningen University and Research centre

Employment basis: Temporary for specified period
Duration of the contract: 4 years.
Maximum hours per week: 38

Additional conditions of employment:
A sandwich PhD position, which is a grant to complete a PhD thesis, while being employed at your home institute. The candidate will spend the first and last 6-9 months of a 4 year period at Wageningen University, preparing his/her research proposal and finalizing your thesis. He/she will graduate at Wageningen University. In between he/she will perform your research in Brazil. Expenses as agreed upon in the contract are covered by the grant.

Additional information about the vacancy can be obtained from:

Prof. L.C. Costa
E-mail address: l.costa@ufv.br

Dr. M.A. Slingerland
E-mail address: maja.slingerland@wur.nl

Application

---

You can apply for this job before 15-09-2008 by sending your application to:

Wageningen University, Department of Plant Sciences, chair group Plant Production Systems
Dr. G. van de Ven
P.O. Box 430
6700 AK Wageningen
The Netherlands
E-mail address: Gerrie.vandeven@wur.nl