Barbara Öllerer wins IUFRO Student Award

ForestNavigator congratulates Barbara Öllerer on winning an IUFRO Student Award for Excellence in Forest Science!

Barbara Öllerer obtained the award for her Master’s thesis “Gender-specific barriers in forestry: How do Austrian female leaders perceive barriers and what are their strategies to overcome them?”

In this thesis Barbara Öllerer addresses gender issues in the Austrian forestry sector. The thesis goes beyond merely using numbers and statistics as the only measure of gender equality and examines the underlying values, norms, and structures. It conducts an empirical investigation based on qualitative interviews and addresses reasons for underrepresentation, gender-specific barriers, and goes one step further by additionally addressing ways to overcome them. Thus, the thesis is an important contribution to research in this field.

Within ForestNavigator, Barbara Öllerer organises Stakeholder engagement activities (WP1).