Future Thinkers' Award Winner Dr Francis Mani is developing country-specific emission factors for livestock through his research.
In 2023, Pacific Agriculture Scholarships Support and Climate Resilience Program (PASS-CR) academic supervisors were offered the opportunity to develop interdisciplinary research skills in climate change through the Future Thinkers' Awards. This initiative is part of the PASS-CR program funded by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR).
Dr Francis Mani received the prestigious Future Thinkers' Award for his project in greenhouse gas (GHG) measurements in the agricultural sector. Since winning the award, Dr Mani has undertaken capacity development training in the SF6 tracer technique to estimate methane emissions from dairy cows at Ellinbank Smartfarm in Victoria, Australia. The techniques that Dr Mani has been learning through his award will contribute to the development of country-specific emission factors for the livestock sector in Fiji. These emission factors are needed to improve accuracy in the measurement of GHG emissions, support mitigation efforts, and facilitate effective reporting of GHG emissions in national inventories.
Dr Mani says that hands-on learning for these methods is "very important as the finer logistics, workflow and 'know-how' are not usually discussed in research papers, and it was great to dive into it and get my hands dirty (literally getting cow dung on my hands) to learn the SF6 tracer technique." Dr Mani expressed he now has more confidence in developing the technique in-house and locally and collaborating with the Ministry of Agriculture, ACIAR, and the University of the South Pacific (USP).
Dr Mani has been able to form a strong working relationship with Mr Richard Williams from the Department of Environment, Energy and Climate Action (DEECA) and Dr Natalie Doran-Browne of Agriculture Research Advisors through the Future Thinkers award and the related ACIAR projects. They have started discussions about new potential project ideas, particularly in the sugarcane industry and opportunities to expand the use of SF6 technique in other Pacific Island Countries. These new initiatives will allow Dr Mani to scale-out the impact of his award across the Pacific and allow him to expand his work to other sectors.
In the coming months, Dr. Mani plans to collaborate with the Ministry of Agriculture and ACIAR to procure equipment for local capacity development in SF6 tracer methods. Additionally, he aims to partner with the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) in Wellington, New Zealand. Dr Mani says, "I am looking forward to developing this proposal with NIWA during the second phase of my Future Thinkers' Award."
The Future Thinkers' Awards program looks forward to sharing updates on Dr Mani's progress.
For more information about the Future Thinkers' Awards and Dr Mani's research project, please visit https://www.passcrprogram.com/passcr-future-thinkers-initiative.