Dessalegn Obsi Gemeda

Dessalegn Obsi Gemeda (PhD) is an Associate Professor at Jimma University College of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine. He holds a PhD in climate change adaptation and mitigation from Jimma University, an MSc in Geo-information Science from Wageningen University in the Netherlands, and a BEd in Geography and Environmental Studies from Jimma University. Dr. Gemeda has published 88 articles in peer-reviewed journals. Currently, he collaborates with various professionals from diverse countries, boasting over 130 co-authors. Majority of his publications are recognized for their high impact factors and indexed in Scopus and Web of Sciences. His work is mainly focused on the application of geospatial techniques to assess environmental challenges, particularly in Ethiopia. Key focus areas of his work include land suitability evaluation, agricultural drought assessment, impact of forest cover change on climate change and biodiversity conservation. Comprehensive analyses have been performed on urban heat island dynamics, urban green space suitability, and the correlation of forest and wetland with land surface temperature. They have conducted research on the evidence of climate change, the analysis of meteorological data trends, and the assessment of climate change adaptation strategies. Beyond climate and land use dynamics, Dr. Gemeda also conducted research on biodiversity conservation and assessment with special emphasis on birds, primate and other small mammals such as Morris’s bat. Their works have significantly enhanced the understanding of environmental changes and challenges in Ethiopia, and their research findings have been widely cited.
Dr. Gemeda collaborates with multi-stakeholders on climate change and biodiversity conservation in southwestern part of Ethiopia. He possesses rich experience in project management, both small grants and mega collaborative projects. The author is working with multi-stakeholders to bring sustainable solutions to environmental problems, mainly climate change. In terms of grant, he has received a total of 12 small international grants, namely, Six from the USA, four from UK and one from Asia. Currently, he serves as a Co-Principal Investigator of one large project ‘ABCDryBASIN Project (2023-2027)’ with topic entitled as ‘‘Stakeholder Participation to Enhance Drought Resilience through Reinforced Indigenous Knowledge and Smart Tools for Socially-Just Water Management.’ In addition to teaching and research responsibilities, he has supervised over 75 MSc students and currently supervising more than 15 PhD students. He is supervising PhD students at Jimma University, Addis Ababa University, Harmaya University, and Bule Hora University. He holds the position of associate editor for the Discovered Applied Science journal (Springer Nature) and serve as an academic editor for PLOS ONE. Furthermore, he is an associate editor for Journal of Agriculture and Livestock Farming. Recently, he served as a Guest-Editor for special issues in land journal on land-climate interactions.