University of Lisbon, Instituto Superior d’Agronomia (ISA)

The School of Agriculture (ISA – Instituto Superior de Agronomia) is one of the 18 schools of the University of Lisbon (UL), which is the largest and most prestigious university in Portugal and is one of Europe’s leading universities. UL brings together various areas of knowledge and has a privileged position for facilitating the contemporary evolution of science, technology, arts and humanities. With over than 160 years of experience, ISA is the leading Portuguese education and research institution in Agriculture and Forestry and it currently enrolls 2,000 students while it has 144 faculty members of which 130 hold a PhD. The Forest Research Centre (CEF) and the Centre for Applied Ecology (CEABN) are both hosted at ISA and are the top research centers in forest sciences in Portugal. They combine research on the functioning of the main forest ecosystems in Portugal and on their relevant forest products and services, with fundamental and methodological research of broad scientific interest. CEF and CEABN include 149 Ph.D. Both research centers include top researchers on forest models, forest management planning methods and decision support systems and fire ecology and management as well as conservation of forest biodiversity and ecosystem services. These researchers have either coordinated or lead the Portuguese participation in several international research (e.g. FP7, H2020, ESF), staff exchange (e.g. Marie Curie) and education (e.g. Erasmus Mundus), projects. ISA will thus be able to commit the resources needed for the success of the project.

Main tasks of ISA in NOBEL

Will participate in activities of WP1 | Geographic information and auction platform

José G. Borges is Associate Professor of Forest Management and Economics at the School of Agriculture (ISA) and Coordinator of the Forest Research Centre (CEF). He coordinates the Erasmus Mundus Master Course ‘Mediterranean Forest and Natural Resources Management (MEDfOR)’ since its inception in 2012. Has led research on the development of decision support systems and methods to attract payments for ecosystem services in projects involving public administration, industry, owners associations, firms and NGOs in the primary sector. Principal investigator or leading the Portuguese participation in 23 research projects. Co-author of 104 international peer review publications and 176 other publications. Participation in 36 committees and editorial boards of international meetings and web of science (WoS) journals. Supervision of 10 post doc programs, 14 PhD dissertations and 18 MSc. thesis.

Ana Raquel Rodrigues has a Bachelor and a Master degree in Agronomic Engineering. She recently completed her PhD in Forestry Engineering and Natural Resources. She is currently working as a research fellow at the Forest Research Center of the School of Agriculture, Lisbon University, collaborating in two international projects involving the development of alternative forest management models for the valorization of different forest ecosystem services. Working in the soil sciences field, she has developed her expertise on soil functions and related system sustainability, under different management options.

Brigite Botequim holds a PhD degree in Forestry and Natural Resources and is currently Assistant Researcher at the Forest Research Centre (CEF), of ISA. Her main expertise is on regulatory ecosystem services and the assessment of ecosystem service supply as response to climate change and alternative forest management models/cover dynamics. She lectured the Natural Resource Management course as part of the Erasmus Mundus Master Programme – MEDfOR (2015/2016), and Forest Management and Certification (2019/2020) to the 3rd year of Forest Engineering degree at ISA. Participated in several scientific projects (9 National, 9 International) and international conferences and she is co-author of 16 WoS papers and 2 book chapters. She has consultancy experience and scientific guidance in 1 Phd (ongoing) and 4 MSc. dissertations, as well as supervision of PhD visiting fellows at CEF/ ISA, and participation as committee member of the jury in several master degrees.

Marta Mesquita has a PhD and Master in Statistics and Operations Research and a Bachelor Degree in Applied Mathematics, Faculty of Sciences, University of Lisbon. She is an integrated member of the Mathematics, Fundamental Applications and Operations Research R&D Unit (Faculty of Sciences). Her main research interests focus on Mixed Integer Programming, Network Optimization and (Meta)Heuristics. She has participated in national and international funded research projects in the area of Matematics and Forestry Manangement. She has coordinated two national funded research projects in the area of Mathematics. She has published papers addressing Operations Research methodologies in transportation, scheduling, vehicle routing and blending problems. She has participated in the program/organizing committees of several conferences/workshops/schools in the area of Operations Research. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor at Section of Mathematics, Instituto Superior de Agronomia, University of Lisbon. She has (co)supervised master thesis on Food Engineering, Environmental Engineering, and Operations Research.

Carlos Caldas holds an MSc in Forestry and Natural Resources Engineering and an MBA. He has a 20-year long career as a forestry consultant in Portugal, specializing in forest regional planning and forest management. In 2017 he has embraced the challenges of research work at CEF/ISA working in the European research project ALTERFOR. His main research interests are: forest economics, forest sector modelling and strategic planning.

Marlene Marques has a bachelor’s in Forestry and a master’s degree in Forestry and Natural Resources, from the School of Agriculture, and a master’s degree in Earth Resources, from the School of Engineering (University of Lisbon). Her 22-year professional career demonstrates my experience and expertise in the management and planning of forest resources and civil protection. Further, she has worked as a researcher in the framework of 13 research projects at the Forest Research Centre, School of Agriculture. She is currently working on my PhD, with the title “Addressing forest and natural resources management planning with multicriteria approaches and group decision-making techniques.”

Miguel Nuno Bugalho is Principal Investigator at the Centre for Applied Ecology “Prof. Baeta Neves ” (CEABN) and Assistant Professor on Forest and Wildlife Ecology and Conservation at the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment, School of Agriculture (ISA), University of Lisbon. He has a PhD in Zoology from the University of Aberdeen and the Macaulay Land Use Research Institute, UK, an MSc in Ecology from the University of Aberdeen, UK, and a first degree in Forestry, Natural Resources Management, from the Technical University of Lisbon, Portugal. He has had Post-doctoral experience in CSIRO, Australia and the Nicholas School of Environment, Duke University, USA.

Susete Marques in 2013 got her a PhD degree in Forestry from Instituto Superior de Agronomia/Technical University of Lisbon about Integration of Fire Risk into Forest Stands Management in Portugal. Actually, she is a Researcher at the Forest Research Center/University of Lisbon. Her research interests are mostly in Forest Management Planning, Optimization, Decision Support Systems, Multicriteria Decision Analysis/Methods, Fire risk and management and ecosystem services. Susete is the principal researcher/coordinator of one project and co PI a project, both funded by Portuguese Science Foundation. She participates in 5 projects and participated in 13 other projects successfully concluded. She is co author of 18 papers, 6 book chapters, 7 papers in conference proceedings, 54 communications in national/international conferences/workshops and seminars. The teaching activity involved the collaboration in 2 Courses of the Forestry Engineering and Natural Resources degrees in ISA. Supervisor of 1 PhD student and 3 master thesis.

Isabel Martins graduated in Agro-industrial Engineering by the Instituto Superior de Agronomia of the former Technical University of Lisbon in 1988, obtained the Master’s degree in Mathematics Applied to Economics and Management in the field of Operational Research by the Instituto Superior de Economia e Gestão from the same university in 1995, and the degree of Doctor in Statistics and Operational Research in the Specialty of Optimization by the Faculdade de Ciências of the University of Lisbon in 2003. Since this year, she is Assistant Professor at the Instituto Superior de Agronomia of the University of Lisbon. The application of Operational Research to ISA domains, namely to forests, has been a characteristic of the scientific work developed. This work has resulted from collaborations with peers from ISA and other academic institutions, national and international. The candidate participated and participates in several national and European R&D projects.

Logan Bingham holds a BA in Liberal Arts, Dual Concentrations: Chemistry, Anthropology from Bennington College, 2013. He developed internships in 2019 in FSC Portugal and in CTFC, Spain. He is currently enrolled in the Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degree Mediterranean Forestry and Natural Resources Management where he plans to develop a dissertation with the title “Additionality, Efficiency, and Spatial Targeting for PES: Assessment and characterization of innovative optimization and auction applications in SINCERE and NOBEL”.