Hermann
Kam
PhD Researcher
Imperial College London
My research seeks to answer two key questions: 1) how rural lands will be used, and by whom, in the coming years in the UK; 2) how can a broad spectrum of actors and institutions be engaged to deliver public goods through landscape scale collaborations in the future.
The first research question is attributed to the multifunctional rural transition occurring in rural communities over the past several decades. This is reflected in an increasingly diverse community of actors and institutions owning and managing land in the UK. This trend, and the implications of an increasing emphasis on the production of public goods, suggests a need for a deep and timely investigation of how land will be used and by whom in the coming years. Hence, my research seeks to gain a deeper understanding of the shifting patterns of rural land occupancy, particularly the emerging presence of new land managers, in the coming years.
Equally important is the need to understand the specific policy interventions required to engage with this evolving community of landholders - to deliver public goods on the desired landscape scale under the incoming Environmental Land Management (ELM) scheme. Using a combination of Theories of Practices and Theory of Capital, my research will investigate how various actors and institutions can be incentivised to collaborate on a landscape scale for the provision of public goods.
I am currently a PhD researcher under the supervision of Prof. Clive Potter.