PhD position in Biodiversity monitoring for nature-inclusive agrifood transitions
Your job Are you motivated to contribute to the transition toward nature-inclusive agriculture and horticulture? And are you interested in biodiversity, ecosystem services and biological pest control? Then join the NWO-KIC project RISE – Resilient Integrated Systems for Ecosystem restoration as a PhD candidate. You will co-develop an interactive spatial decision-support framework for agrifood transitions in an interdisciplinary team of four PhD candidates, collaborating closely with farmers, growers and societal stakeholders. Biodiversity restoration in agriculture and horticulture is urgently needed, but difficult to realize in practice. Farmers operate in complex systems: they are embedded in value chains, regional communities, regulatory environments, ecological landscapes, and business models that often prioritize short-term productivity and profitability. RISE addresses this challenge by developing systems-based tools and implementation pathways that help stakeholders make nature-inclusive decisions that are ecologically meaningful, economically viable, and socially supported. RISE is an interdisciplinary project involving Eindhoven University of Technology, Wageningen University & Research, Leiden University, and Inholland University of Applied Sciences, together with a broad network of societal partners from agriculture, horticulture, regional development, water management, policy, and civil society. The project works in two regional case areas: Oostland Zuid-Holland, focused on greenhouse horticulture and Reusel-Zuid, focused on open-field agriculture. A third region on tree-nursing will be used for validation and replication. This PhD position is hosted by Wageningen University & Research, within the Laboratory of Entomology and the crop protection team of the Greenhouse Unit in Bleiswijk. You will be part of a closely connected cohort of four PhD candidates working across universities and disciplines. All candidates receive cross-university supervision to ensure deep integration between innovation science, system dynamics, spatial modeling, and ecology. The specific focus of this PhD project is biodiversity monitoring and biological pest control as an ecosystem service. You will study how biodiversity implementation in the two case areas is related to biological pest control as an ecosystems service, and validate key performing indicators. This includes the design of biodiversity heat maps, identifying key indicator species, setting up field and greenhouse experiments to validate ecosystem services, biodiversity monitoring, molecular gut content analyses of key predators and assessing biological control capacity with sentinel prey. Your duties and responsibilities include: Develop, implement and evaluate innovative ways of biodiversity and ecosystem services monitoring Field and greenhouse studies to validate ecosystem services of input key performing indicators Studies to understand how functional diversity can enhance biological pest control Contributing to collaborative scenario development and implementation roadmaps for nature-inclusive agrifood systems. Publishing—sometimes also in collaboration with the other RISE PhDs—in high-quality academic papers on topics such as functional ecology, biological pest control, collaborative innovation for biodiversity restoration and business viability of nature-inclusive transition pathways. You will work here You will work within the entomology team at the expertise centre for Greenhouse Horticulture of Wageningen Research in Bleiswijk, where you will be supervised by Prof. Gerben Messelink as promotor. The research is embedded within the Laboratory of Entomology, which is led by Prof. Bregje Wertheim.The Laboratory of Entomology and the Unit Greenhouse Horticulture are part of the Plant Sciences Group of Wageningen University and Research. You will collaborate closely with the other PhD candidates in RISE, who focus on spatial system mapping and decision-support design, ecological indicators and monitoring strategies. All candidates receive cross-university supervision to ensure deep integration between innovation science, system dynamics, spatial modeling, and ecology. As a WUR PhD candidate you will be co-supervised by prof. Bige Tunçer and Dr. Ershad Sarabi Shahryar from TU/e Built and prof. Peter van Bodegom from Leiden University. In addition, you will also be embedded in the PE&RC graduate school (Home | PE&RC), which will allow you to follow a wide variety of training courses and will provide support during your academic journey. Your qualities For this project we are looking for an enthusiastic, highly motivated, curious, and analytically strong candidate who is eager to contribute to both scientific research and practical impact. This position is ideal for a candidate who is comfortable working interdisciplinary, at the boundary between theory and practice: developing rigorous academic insights while engaging closely with farmers, growers, regional stakeholders, businesses, policymakers, and researchers from other disciplines. You also have: A successfully completed MSc degree in Biology, Plant Sciences or a related discipline; Proven interest in insect ecology and biological pest control; Experience with experimental research on insects; Well-developed organizational and communication skills; fluency in English and preferably Dutch to conduct academic research and effectively engage with local Dutch stakeholders. For this position your command of the English language is expected to be at C1 level. Sometimes it is necessary to submit an internationally recognised Certificate of Proficiency in the English Language. More information can be found here. We offer Wageningen University & Research offers excellent terms of employment. A few highlights from our Collective Labour Agreement include: Partially paid parental leave; working hours that can be discussed and arranged so that they allow for the best possible work-life balance; there is a strong focus on vitality and you can make use of the sports facilities available on campus for a small fee; a fixed year-end bonus of 8.3%; excellent pension scheme. In addition to these first-rate employee benefits, you will receive a fully funded PhD position and you will be offered a course program tailored to your needs and the research team.The gross salary for the first year is € 3.059,- per month rising to € 3.881,- in the fourth year in according to the Collective Labour Agreements for Dutch Universities (CAO-NU) (scale P). This is based on a full-time working week of 38 hours. We offer a temporary contract for 18 months which will be extended for the duration of the project if you perform well. We encourage development and internal mobility within our organisation. Our recruitment and selection policy sets out the conditions that apply specifically to you as a (former) employee. If you have any questions, we are happy to help. You will work on the greenest and most innovative campus in the Netherlands, in an international and open working environment. Coming from abroad Wageningen University & Research is the university and research centre for life sciences.