Gentlemen and Ecolog:
In the early 1980's a gentleman from India visited me in my office to
discuss approaches to reforestation in India. After our discussion I heard
nothing further from him, and I certainly hope that he was able to be
successful in his endeavors and did not suffer some accident or lose hope.
If he tried my suggestions as he understood them, he might have been
successful or he might have failed, not because the techniques are complex,
but most likely because he did not understand the principles behind them.
I have long proposed a way to manage degraded watersheds in a way that
achieves reforestation, supports agriculture and habitat restoration while
reducing disease, reducing labor, reducing contamination and erosion,
increasing groundwater, and providing many other environmental benefits
while improving public welfare. This is done rather cheaply; therefore it is
not so popular with NGO's and GO's. It is integrated rather that
hierarchical, so it is not popular with those who want to maintain power and
make mountains of money. People and organizations who wring livings and
fortunes out of the status quo do not like it. I tried to give the
technology to a Mexican agency which "wanted" to improve an eroded gully
(caused by anthropogenic activities in the upper watershed) in the middle of
a colonia (houses were falling into the gully) but when the officials saw
that they could not milk it for very much, they rejected it. Houses continue
to fall into the gully.
Similarly, I suspect that there is enough official corruption to go around
in India too, but if a group (NGO?) was formed that could resist the
development of corruption from within, they might be able to accomplish
something by avoiding government and large NGO interference.
WT
PS: I suspect that focusing on colloid movement might be a very useful
direction for research, but it would have to be integrated with other
aspects of local ecosystems in applied work.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Nirmalya Chatterjee" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 06, 2012 11:48 PM
Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Careers in Conservation: Crossing the Barren Waste -
Request for Suggestions :)
Neahga -
Thank you for this.You have just made my future post-PhD job search
so much easier. I joined ECOLOG just a few weeks back, at the
recommendation of my department's Graduate Student Representative
and I am learning so much new things and fresh viewpoints on so many
topics !
I am still a semester+ away from graduating with a PhD and haven't yet
started looking for jobs, but your site listings will make it that much
easier.
-
For the larger ECOLOG community I request some help with suggestions from
your vast and varied pool of experience for my proposed career plan.
I am currently a soil-physicist, and am working towards a PhD with most of
my experience in theoretical modeling in vadose zone water/colloid
movement.
I know this is pretty niche research, but that is what my advisor &
funding
agency guidelines dictated - and I was hired. No qualms about that.
I have masters degree level experience in analytical chemistry (about 6
years).
I came into this Soil Science program with the intention of moving towards
applied field level research and/or knowledge implementation.
My aim is to eventually work on soil/water conservation/remediation in my
home
country, India. Aside from that I love teaching so a combined
teaching-research
job would be the final target in India.
I request this groups' members to give me suggestions for making this kind
of
switch from a PhD in theoretical VZ soil physics to soil / water
conservation
work. I hope to get some relevant research experience in soil/water
conservation work before returning to my homeland. What sort of jobs
should
I
aim for ... that is the question.
Thank you !
Nirmalya
On 6 November 2012 19:29, Neahga Leonard <[email protected]>
wrote:
Many tales of woe that I think many of us share in some form or another.
A little while back, when I was in the position of having finished grad
school, finishing the job I had for a year out of it and not knowing what
was coming next I asked the Ecolog community for some assistance in
finding
where to look. The support from the community was overwhelming and I
complied the advice I received into a posting of places to look for work
(job boards and such) that will, hopefully be of use to some people.
The link is below:
http://writingfornature.wordpress.com/links-to-interesting-blogs/finding-work/
Best of luck to everyone searching for work. It is a satisfying but
unforgiving and harsh field we have chosen.
Neahga
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