2016

After graduating from the Recanati-Kaplan Centre Postgraduate Diploma in International Wildlife Conservation Practice in 2016, I was employed by a local NGO in Azerbaijan – IDEA (International Dialogue for Environmental Action). At IDEA, I coordinated conservation projects on the Caucasian leopard (Panthera pardus ciscaucasica), European bison (bison bonasus), as well as anadromous fish species. I also taught GIS and remote sensing at Baku State University. This contributed to delivering better qualified staff for employment in the conservation sector and delivering more up-to-date methods for use in conservation management and in research on wildlife and biodiversity conservation.

Meanwhile, I attended a Biodiversity Conservation and Ecosystem Services course as part of the UNEP/UNESCO/BMU International Short Course on Ecosystem Management at the University of Dresden in Germany. Through this course, I learned important concepts and methods in the field of biodiversity conservation and ecosystem services research and policy-making from experienced conservationists.

In August 2018, I joined the SILVIS Lab as a Doctoral Research Assistant at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the US. I am currently working on a project funded by NASA – studying land cover and land use changes that have occurred in the Caucasus region over the last half century. I am using remote sensing to evaluate how land use change has affected habitats and distribution of the wild mammal species in Azerbaijan. You can now contact me through rizayeva@wisc.edu