Professor EJ Milner-Gulland

Tasso Leventis Professor of Biodiversity; Director of the Interdisciplinary Centre for Conservation Science

About

Professor Milner-Gulland is interested in understanding how social, ecological and behavioural factors interact and how they affect key issues in current conservation.

She was lead author on a 2021 paper outlining the 'Four Steps for the Earth' framework for implementing global commitments to tackling biodiversity loss - which the International Union for Conservation of Nature has voted to support and promote.

Her research group focuses on three themes: understanding resource user incentives, planning for effective and socially just conservation, and accounting for social-ecological system dynamics. They seek to understand and improve the effectiveness of different approaches to designing conservation interventions, in both land and marine ecosystems.

Professor Milner-Gulland also works on the illegal wildlife trade and is interested in designing, monitoring and evaluating conservation interventions in order to improve their effectiveness. She is particularly interested in the conservation ecology of the saiga antelope in Central Asia, and co-founded the Saiga Conservation Alliance in 2006 as well as the Conservation Optimism movement in 2016.

She is an advisor to a number of bodies including the International Union for Conservation of Nature and the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals. As well as chairing the UK Government’s Darwin Expert Committee, Professor Milner-Gulland is a Trustee of WWF-UK. 

Expertise

  • Biodiversity
  • Conservation science
  • Saiga antelopes
  • Bushmeat hunting
  • Conservation in Africa and Central Asia
  • Sustainable use of wildlife
  • Poverty and development links to the environment

Media experience

Professor Milner-Gulland has extensive experience of working with a range of media, including radio, TV, and print outlets.

Languages

English, French, Russian