Doctoral candidate in project 14 - Hamilton Majiwa

I am Hamilton Majiwa, a PhD fellow in the HEALENAE Doctoral Network at the University of Edinburgh, School of Social and Political Science, and the University of Nairobi, Department of Anthropology, Gender, and African Studies.

Before joining the University of Edinburgh, I worked for the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in Nairobi, Kenya, where I supported research and development focused on equitable and locally led climate adaptation in the Livestock Climate and Environment program.

My PhD project tilted, Community, Policy, and Expertise in the Changing Ecology of Vector-Borne Diseases in North-Eastern Kenya, is part of  HELEANEA Project 14: The Frontiers of Vector Borne Disease: Expertise and Response in Africa and Europe, supervised by Professor Rebecca Marsland at the University of Edinburgh and Professor Salome Bukachi at the University of Nairobi explores how climate-related ecological changes are transforming vector ecologies and disease risk in Ijara, Garissa County, Kenya. The study conceptualizes vector expansion not only as a biomedical issue but as a socio-ecological one as well, where climate change, expertise, and community knowledge intersect. 

In the project, I will explore how communities interpret and respond to observed changes in insect populations and illness patterns in humans and livestock, how local adaptive ways interact with national and transnational climate and health policies, and how historical and political factors shape the production, circulation, and uptake of knowledge about vector-borne diseases. I aim to demonstrate how local adaptive strategies to vector-borne diseases in humans and livestock can be applied in responding to these diseases in newly affected parts of Africa and Europe as a consequence of climate change.