About

Ben is an economist and forester, currently helping develop work on conservation finance in the Grantham Research Institute’s newly created ForestLAB. His work emphasizes ‘big’ datasets and geospatial tools.

Background

Ben’s doctoral work at the University of Toronto focused on forest sector development paths, remote sensing of forest management, and the theory and empirics of productivity measurement. He has been extensively involved in the Canadian forest sector, including three years spent as the climate change lead for the Forest Products Association of Canada. He holds an M.Sc. in forest ecology and a B.A. in Environment and Development studies.

Research interests

  • Forest sector development
  • Green growth
  • Offsets and climate finance
  • Economic applications of geospatial ‘big data’
  • Environmental behavioural economics

Research

Research - 2023

The authors of this paper take a behavioral economics approach, administering simplified decision problems (“choice experiments”), questions about choice-relevant preferences and views (“elicitation questions”), and a psychometric scale (the New Ecological Paradigm scale) to a difficult-to-recruit sample (n = 100) of Canadian professionals involved in managing Rangifer tarandus caribou (Woodland Caribou). Read more

Policy

Policy - 2023

News

News - 2023

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