Debbie Pierce

Debbie Pierce is a visiting researcher at the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT as well as a PhD candidate at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada with Dr. Terry Sunderland. Her research is in tropical forestry, land tenure and access, and gender. She has two bachelor’s degrees in economics and environmental policy from the University of Michigan and a master’s degree in environmental science and economics from the University of California, Santa Barbara. While at the University of California, Santa Barbara she worked with Dr. Gary Libecap on a land demarcation and land value project in California and Ohio, which sparked her interest in land ownership and its relationship with inequality and environmental outcomes. Prior to her PhD she worked at the World Bank in Washington, DC with indigenous communities, gender and forestry issues focused mostly on Latin America. She currently lives in Cali, Colombia where she is attempting to learn salsa dancing and go hiking as much as she can.