IMM (Inez) Dekker, MSc BSc

Inez Dekker is a Ph.D. candidate in the Knowledge, Technology, and Innovation Group at Wageningen University. They hold a B.Sc. and M.Sc. in International Development Studies from Wageningen University, with a specialization in rural sociology.

Inez’s doctoral research focuses on learning in agroecological transition processes. In such processes, norms and everyday practices in our agricultural and food systems will (or must) be called into question and changed, with collective learning playing an essential role. Inez is studying learning within the agroecological transition program CropMix, a multi-year research program in the Netherlands in which arable farmers, NGOs, government agencies, food chain partners, and researchers collaborate to combine different crops on a single field through strip cropping to increase biodiversity and reduce pesticide use. By studying and supporting the collective efforts in this program, for example in living labs, Inez focuses on how multispecies interactions and learning in sustainability transitions relate and can be further activated.

Inez’s interests lie in rural sociology, posthumanism, sustainability transitions, agricultural systems, critical development studies, and rural ways of doing and thinking. They believe in the value of transdisciplinary and translocal approaches; therefore, in addition to their PhD, Inez is an active member of the international art initiative and multivocal network known as the “Rural School of Economics.” Within this initiative, they collaborate with artist Wapke Feenstra on projects such as “Cow and Landscape” and “Rerooting in the Polder,” and focuses on cultural co-production, trans-local exchanges, and everyday economies in the ever-changing “Dutch” landscape.

Below you’ll find more information about the projects Inez is working on:

CropMix: Learning and multispecies interactions in living labs aimed at agro-ecological transition 

Rural School of Economics: "Cow and Landscape" and "Rerooting in the Polder"