I’m a PhD student in the Department of Animal and Plant Sciences focusing on the impacts of the global wildlife trade.
I will use quantitative methods to assess the direct effect that trade is having species on species abundance and extinction risk. I’m also interested global policy and management of the wildlife trade, in particular the role and effectiveness of CITES in tackling unsustainable trade and the trade of globally threatened species.
Broadly my interests focus on conservation and sustainable long terms outcomes for humans and nature.
You can find Oscar on Twitter.
It was great to see Oscar’s wildlife trade meta-analysis reported on by the Guardian. If you want to find out more then you can read Wildlife trade research in The Guardian.
This story was also picked up by The Hindu – Global wildlife trade causes decline of species abundance: study. And the Daily Mail carried a story about this research too.
After the publication of a paper on deforestation, Oscar wrote us a summary of the work. In this he explained how ecosystem services payments could bolster shifting cultivators and carbon stocks.
Morton, O., Scheffers, B.R., Haugaasen, T. et al. Impacts of wildlife trade on terrestrial biodiversity. Nat Ecol Evol (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-021-01399-y
Economically viable forest restoration in shifting cultivation landscapes by Oscar Morton, Joli R Borah and David P Edwards. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab7f0d
Read Oscar’s summary of this paper on utilising carbon payments to enable economically viable forest restoration in India.