Staff

NRI Commercial Manager and invertebrate pathologist. Twenty-eight years’ experience working in sustainable development, comprising: 16 years' experience of project management; twelve years’ experience of research and development on insect diseases as crop protection tools in the tropics.

Key expertise:

Project financial management (pre and post-award); grant application processes; project management; client liaison; biopesticide development.

In-country experience:

Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Malawi, Benin, India, Ghana, Thailand and Bolivia.

Professor Sheryl L Hendriks is Professor of Food Security and Director of the NRI. She previously held positions at the Universities of Pretoria, KwaZulu-Natal and Natal, South Africa. She is an internationally recognised transdisciplinary researcher focussing on food security. She has extensive experience in the design of policy frameworks, policy analysis and programme design. Her research focuses on food security policy analysis at the national and global levels. More recently her work has focussed on food systems analysis, including sustainable and healthy diets.

She is actively engaged in high-level global food security policy think tanks and panels as well as being influential in food systems research and policy debates. Some of these engagements include co-leading the Action Track on Nutritious, Safe Food for the United Nations (UN) Food Systems Summit Scientific Group, the Malabo-Montpellier Panel advising African governments on public policy choices and a member of the UN Committee on Food Security’s High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition from 2010 to 2015. She led the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme’s (CAADP) Food Security Pillar from 2006 to 2010 and the drafting of the Inter-Academy Partnership’s consensus report on Food and Nutrition and Agriculture report and was a member of the team drafting the global synthesis report on this topic. This work led to her appointment as a member of the Academy of Science of South Africa in 2020.

Contracts co-ordinator. Responsible for negotiating and administering NRI's contracts, with expertise in: providing guidance on all contractual issues (including contract law and intellectual property rights); liaising with NRI's key clients; and advising NRI colleagues on the issuing of sub-contracts. Previous administrative experience within NRI includes: file records management and registration; corporate publications and publicity; and personnel support.

Sharron has worked with the Natural Resources Institute since January 2001. In her role as Awards and Grants Manger she is responsible for line managing and coordinating the Post Awards Team ensuring efficient and effective financial regulatory guidance and professional services support is provided to the NRI’s operations. Sharron is responsible in ensuring the smooth and efficient management of NRI-project and grant finances from inception to project completion, ensuring audit and financial reporting obligations of external clients and donors are met.

Caroline Troy is NRI's Senior Strategy Support Manager. She has worked with NRI since October 1990 and in her role she is responsible for supporting the implementation of NRI's strategic plan with particular focus on income generation through knowledge exchange and postgraduate teaching and learning. Caroline is responsible for planning and coordinating NRI's comprehensive events programme including project conferences, symposia, and visitor hosting, while also driving NRI's marketing strategy and social media communications to build the institute's reputation. She covers development and delivery of marketing materials, postgraduate programme promotion, alumni engagement, and strategic stakeholder relationship building. She also oversees NRI's travel procedures and logistics, manages financial planning and budget tracking for events and activities, and maintains KE Framework data for reporting. Caroline has managed events and travel arrangements across multiple continents supporting NRI's international project portfolio and has travelled and managed events in Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Benin, Uganda, Spain, Rwanda, Colombia, India, Vietnam, and the UK.

Huiyi Yang joined  NRI in May 2020. His research focuses on using modelling approaches to understand climate change and air pollution impacts on crop production and food security, especially for those regions most vulnerable to climate change.  He also has interests in assessing uncertainty and adaptation approaches to climate change.

Huiyi obtained his BSc and PhD from the University of Leeds. He initially trained in climate and atmospheric science and then expanded his research into climate change impacts on agriculture through his work at the University of Exeter and Rothamsted Research. This broadening of expertise has made  his work more interdisciplinary and has positioned him well for  contributing substantively to this growing area of research.

Huiyi has extensive experience in numerical modelling. He developed a new crop (i.e. winter wheat) within the Met Office Land Surface Model (LSM) JULES/JULES-Crop and evaluated the air pollution impacts on crop yield/production and the regional carbon cycle. He used the GLAM crop model to access the crop yield and failure rates for the East Asian Monsoon region under a geoengineered climate. He also used the SPACSYS model to simulate the crop rotation system for the Loess region.

Huiyi began his career studying radiation effects on the atmosphere using an LEM model focusing on evaluating the response of the atmosphere to using observed ice particle shapes in radiation rather than the often-used idealised shapes.   Huiyi has been involved in many international modelling projects, including developing a case study for a model inter-comparison project on cirrus clouds (GCSS WG2).