Minds Behind Maps

Catherine Nakalembe - Food in Stores Isn't Enough: Food Security in Africa - MBM #24

Episode Summary

Dr Catherine Nakalembe is an Associate Research Professor at University of Maryland and the Program Head of NASA Harvest Africa. We talk about some of her work on using satellite imagery for Food Security in her home country of Uganda & how she got into this field in the first place.

Episode Notes

Dr Catherine Nakalembe is an Associate Research Professor at University of Maryland and the Program Head of NASA Harvest Africa. We talk about some of her work on using satellite imagery for Food Security in her home country of Uganda & how she got into this field in the first place.

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Episode Sponsors:

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About Catherine:

Shownotes:

- NASA Harvest
- Catherine’s Bio on University of Maryland’s website

Books & Recommendations:

- The New Humanitarian

- BBC Discovery

- Africa Today

- Little Stories for Tiny People

- Catherine’s appearances on Science in Action

- Leadership Journey

- The Divide by Jason Hickel

- Jason Hickel’s Twitter

 

Time-stamps: 

00:00:00 Introduction 
00:02:04 Conversation begins: Catherine describes herself 
00:08:19 Starting by wanting to play badminton 
00:20:45 Wanting to work back in Uganda 
00:24:32 How Catherine got into Food Security 
00:32:15 What even is Food Security? 
00:34:14 The Role of Remote Sensing in Food Security 
00:37:58 Who benefits mapping food security? 
00:44:23 How do people on the ground perceive insights from satellites? 
00:48:54 Creating insights that actually get used 
00:52:43 You can't improve what you can't measure 
00:55:41 The Double-Edge Sword that comes with Remote Sensing at Scale 
01:00:52 Not getting lost in the Maps 
01:03:32 Incentives: Working from a University in the US, helping Uganda 
01:10:40 The relationship between Private & Public sector in regards to Climate Change 
01:13:13 The Government as the main Private Sector's Government 
01:20:10 Story Telling as a Source of Change 
01:27:02 Inspiring & Helping Others 
01:30:53 Books & Podcast recommendations

 

If you want to hear more about me & the podcast: