PhD position: Discovering enabling conditions for nature-inclusive agriculture in Dutch living labs

Are you an enthusiastic and ambitious researcher, passionate about discovering new policy options, regulations, and organizational arrangements for nature-inclusive agriculture? Do you like to do action-oriented research that helps us to reconfigure ‘the rules of the game’ as part of sustainability transitions? If yes, then we encourage you to apply!

The Knowledge, Technology and Innovation group at Wageningen University is seeking an enthusiast and ambitious researcher who wants discover new policy options, regulations and organisational arrangements for nature-inclusive agriculture in collaboration with farmers and other stakeholders.

Cropmix is a large transdisciplinary research program that joins forces with the agricultural sector to achieve a breakthrough in the transition to sustainable arable farming. Agro-ecological research focusses on the potential of strip cropping in fostering responsible pest- and disease management and soil health. Social-scientific research investigates which social and institutional changes in the food system are needed to enable and accelerate the transition to sustainable and biodiversity-positive crop production. This is done by setting up living labs in which stakeholders and researchers collaborate.

The PhD-candidate will contribute to identifying socio-economic constraints, and support the co-design of more conducive regulations, incentive systems, organizational models and policies for nature-inclusive agriculture. Subsequently, the living labs will play a role in testing and validating such social innovations, and in enhancing the support for them among farmers, in value chains and in policy networks.

The goal of this PhD project is to create insight in social and institutional options and leverages that may help to overcome constraints to strip cropping, and to explore novel methods through which the contribution of novel policy options, incentive systems and organizational solutions can be tested in the living labs.

The two more specific aims are:

• to understand how the use of nature-inclusive farming practices are is dependent on changes in the broader (farm, value-chain and policy) environment, and where leverages can be found to induce system-level change.
• to understand and support experimentation with institutional options in living labs and assess their potential to support a shift towards nature-inclusive agriculture.
• to develop and apply creative methodological strategies that make it possible to assess and validate the potential of institutional options, and/or enhance their support in policy networks.

You will work here
The successful candidate will become part of the highly dynamic Knowledge, Technology and Innovation group. You will be supervised by Prof. Cees Leeuwis and Dr. Barbara van Mierlo.

We are looking for a talented, curious and engaged researcher, with:

• MSc degree in a relevant social-scientific field;
• strong interest in and relevant knowledge on the social and institutional dimensions of sustainability transitions;
• strong interest in and relevant knowledge on qualitative, quantitative and participatory research methods and data analysis approaches;
• interest in transdisciplinary collaboration and action-oriented research;
• excellent analytical skills and conceptual understanding;
• strong communicative, collaboration, networking and writing skills;
• good knowledge of English language, in listening, speaking and writing (C1 level );
• Dutch speaking (B1 level) and/or willingness to learn Dutch.

The position is available for a contract of 0.8 – 1.0 fte from 1 February 2024 for a duration of four years till 1 February 2028.

Wageningen University & Research offers excellent terms of employment. A few highlights from our Collective Labour Agreement include:

• partially paid parental leave;
• working hours that can be discussed and arranged so that they allow for the best possible work-life balance;
• the option to accrue additional compensation / holiday hours by working more;
• there is a strong focus on vitality and you can make use of the sports facilities available on campus for a small fee;
• a fixed December bonus of 8.3%;
• excellent pension scheme.

In addition to these first-rate employee benefits, you will receive a fully funded PhD position and you will be offered a course program tailored to your needs and the research team.

The gross salary for the first year is € 2.770 - per month rising to € 3.539,- in the fourth year in according to the Collective Labour Agreements for Dutch Universities (CAO-NU) (scale P). This is based on a full-time working week of 38 hours. Additionally, a contact of 0,8 fte is also possible. We offer a temporary contract for 18 months which will be extended for the duration of the project (1 February 2024- 1 February 2028) if you perform well.

There are plenty of options for personal initiative in a learning environment, and we provide excellent training opportunities. We are offering a unique position in an international environment with a pleasant and open working atmosphere.

You are going to work at the greenest and most innovative campus in Holland, and at a university that has been chosen as the “ Best University ” in the Netherlands for the 18th consecutive time.

Wageningen University & Research
The mission of Wageningen University & Research is “To explore the potential of nature to improve the quality of life”. Under the banner Wageningen University & Research, Wageningen University and the specialised research institutes of the Wageningen Research Foundation have joined forces in contributing to finding solutions to important questions in the domain of healthy food and living environment.

With its roughly 30 branches, 7,200 employees (6,400 fte) and 13,200 students and over 150.000 participants to WUR’s Life Long Learning, Wageningen University & Research is one of the leading organisations in its domain. The unique Wageningen approach lies in its integrated approach to issues and the collaboration between different disciplines.. An integrated approach to problems and the cooperation between various disciplines are at the heart of Wageningen’s unique approach. WUR has been named Best Employer in the Education category for 2019-2020.

These are the points our employees list as good reasons to come work at WUR: read the 5 reasons to come work at WUR

We will recruit for the vacancy ourselves, so no employment agencies please. However, sharing in your network is appreciated.