Dr. Brendan Fisher is Professor at the University of Vermont. His research and fieldwork lie at the nexus of conservation, development, natural resource economics and human behavior. He is the author with colleagues of two books, Valuing Ecosystem Services (Earthscan, London, 2008) and A Field Guide to Economics for Conservationists (Roberts and Company, 2015). Brendan teaches courses on sustainability science, behavioral economics, environmental/ecological economics and ecosystem management.
His field research has been undertaken in Borneo, Cambodia, Colombia, Mozambique, and Tanzania. He was a Rockefeller Bellagio Fellow working on relationships between the ecological conditions of coastal regions, gender inequality and childhood health. In 2021-2022, he was a Fulbirght Fellow in Spain working on changing socio-ecological conditions and ecosystem services in the Spanish Pyrenees. When he’s not working, he spends most of his time enjoying the Vermont outdoors with his wife and three children.
Gund Fellow, Professor, Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources
Research and/or Creative Works
Conservation, development, natural resource economics, and human behavior
Publications
• Grima, N., Corcoran, W., Hill-James, C., Langton, B., Sommer, H.,Fisher, B. The importance of urban natural areas and urban ecosystem services during the COVID-19 pandemic (2020) Plos one 15 (12), e0243344
• Naidoo, R., Fisher, B., Reset sustainable development goals for a pandemic world. Nature (2020) 583 (7815), 198-201
• Byerly, H., D'Amato, A.W., Hagenbuch, S., Fisher, B. Conservation Science, & Practice. (2019). Social influence and forest habitat conservation: Experimental evidence from Vermont's maple producers. e98.
• Fisher, B, Marteau, T, & Balmford, A. (2019). Use nudges to change behaviour towards conservation. Nature 569 (7758), 630-630
• Fisher, B., Herrera, D., Adams, D., Fox, H.E., Gallagher, L., Gerkey, D, . . . Johnson, K. (2019). Can nature deliver on the sustainable development goals? The Lancet Planetary Health, 3(3), e112-e113.
• Grima, N., Fisher, B., Ricketts, T. H., & Sonter, L.J. (2019). Who benefits from ecosystem services? Analysing recreational moose hunting in Vermont, USA. Oryx, 1-9.
• Huang, G., Zhou, W., Qian, Y., & Fisher, B. (2019). Breathing the same air? Socioeconomic disparities in PM2. 5 exposure and the potential benefits from air filtration. Science of The Total Environment, 657, 619-626.
• Jiang, Y., Huang, G., & Fisher, B. (2019). Air quality, human behavior and urban park visit: A case study in Beijing. Journal of Cleaner Production, 118000.
• Naidoo, R, Gerkey, D, Hole, D, Pfaff, A, Ellis, AM, Golden, CD, . . . Fisher, B. (2019). Evaluating the impacts of protected areas on human well-being across the developing world. Science Advances 5(4), eaav3006.
Awards and Recognition
• Fulbright Fellow – Spain 2021-2022
• Rockefeller Bellagio Fellow, working on relationships between the ecological conditions of coastal regions, gender inequality, and childhood health
Associations and Affiliations
• Fellow, Centre for Social and Economic Research on the Global Environment (CSERGE- University of East Anglia)
• Editorial Board, PLOS Sustainability and Transformation
• Editorial Board, Oryx
• Editorial Board, Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment
Areas of Expertise and/or Research
Conservation, development, natural resource economics, and human behavior
Education
- PhD, Natural Resources, University of Vermont
- MSc, Environmental Change and Management, Oxford University
- BSc, Civil Engineering, Bucknell University
