Meryl Jagarnath

Institution: University of KwaZulu-Natal

Unit & Faculty: School of Agricultural, Earth, and Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Science and Agriculture

Research field: Urban planning and climate change

Supervisors: Dr Tirusha Thambiran, Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and UKZN; Dr Michael Gebreslasie, UKZN

PROFILE

Meryl hails from Durban, South Africa. She completed her undergraduate BSc Environmental Sciences degree and honours studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), as well as her MSc in Environmental Sciences (2015). Over her master’s studies, she developed a fuller understanding of the complex nature of cities and climate change, and the need for urban spatial planning to respond to climate change and sustainability issues. For her PhD at UKZN, she will investigate how climate change impacts and responses can be mainstreamed into urban spatial planning through developing a novel integrated assessment framework of urban development and climate change impact scenarios. The study will contribute towards understanding the systematic linkages, synergies, and conflicts between climate change responses and urban spatial and land use development strategies at the local scale.