RGS-IBG Postgraduate Research Awards
The Society offers awards of up to £2,500 for PhD students undertaking fieldwork/data collection to advance geographical knowledge. These awards, offered to individuals, aim to help students establish themselves in their particular field.
About the Awards
The RGS-IBG Postgraduate Research Awards were established in 2008 to support PhD students undertaking research and fieldwork. Applicants must be registered at a UK Higher Education Institution. Preference is given to students who do not receive full funding from a research council, university or comparable levels of support from other sources for fieldwork and data collection.
The RGS-IBG Postgraduate Research Awards include the Albert Reckitt Awards, Walters Kundert Grants, the Geographical Club Award, Hong Kong Research Grants and the Dudley Stamp Memorial Award. If your application to the Postgraduate Research Awards is successful you may be given a named award. If you wish to apply for a named award based on your research discipline (such as the Hong Kong Research Grant), please specify this in section 1 of the application form.
Please note, applicants will be notified of the outcome of their application by mid-March 2026 following the external review process. Except for under exceptional circumstances, fieldwork should not begin before 1 April 2026. The Society is unable to support fieldwork which has already taken place.
Deadline: 23 November
Apply now
All prospective grant applicants are encouraged to read our Advice and Resources pages, which include more information about the grants programme, its conditions, how to apply for a grant and what is expected if your application is successful. Please read this information carefully and send your application, or any enquiries, by email to grants@rgs.org.
2025 recipients
Fiona Brehony (The Open University) A Creative and Critical Intervention Exploring the Past, Present and Future of Rivers
Teun De Jong (University of Bristol) Climatic zones shape social behaviour: a case study in Africa’s most common wasp
Majdouline El hichou (University of Edinburgh) Ecologies of resistance: Indigenous women seeding and weaving sustainable futures
Rebecca England (University of Manchester) The SpectroGas: field testing the next generation of gas sampling instrumentation
Millicent Harding (Durham University) Sensing and assessing the Arctic tundra-Forest Ecotone at Relevant scales
Mariana Hernández-Montilla (University of Manchester) Understanding Local Definitions of Success in Forest Landscape Restoration: A Case Study from Mexico's Indigenous Territories
Ali Mert Ipek (University of Manchester) The Highlands in Transition: Rural Restructuring, Livelihood Diversification, and the Commodification of Nature in Turkey's Eastern Black Sea Region
Charles Josefson (King’s College London) Towards the Neuroinclusive City: A Critical Examination of Neuro-Urban Geographies with Young Londoners
Joe Langley (University of Cambridge) Forecasting human-elephant conflict risk in near real-time: Integrating local knowledge of dynamic land use by humans
Eoghan McArdle (Ulster University) Biomass Accumulation and Biodiversity on Artificial Structures in Coastal Waters and the Contribution to Carbon Cycling
Alice Phillips (Aberystwyth University) Ice patches as hotspots for Arctic zoonoses
Kora Ross (University of Aberdeen) Unravelling Glacier and Climate History of the Californian Sierra Nevada during the Last Deglaciation
Fernanda Sobreiro e Cruz (University College London) Women’s resistance: community-based planning and female leadership in favela territories in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Sijie Tan (King’s College London) Comparative Spatial Analysis on England and China’s Care Homes: Improving Care Home Quality Geographic Indices through Delphi Method in China
David Kwok Kwan Tsoi (University of Oxford) Moral Economy of Transnational Housing Market: From Hong Kong to the UK
Molly Urquhart (University College London) Volcanic Wisdom: Strengthening Global Resilience Through Enhanced Multi-Hazard Early Warning and Alert Level Systems
César Vicencio Vega (University of Manchester) Geographies of Urban Discard: Territorial reorganisation and community transformation in Chuquicamata Mining Settlement, Chile
Daniel Walsh (Northumbria University) (De-)Colonising the Cosmos: Exploring Power and Place-Making Amongst “NewSpace” Industries in Texas, USA
Veronica White (University of Exeter) The Farming Futures Cycle Tour: Envisioning the future of farming in England
2024 recipients
Xiaowen Zhan (University of Manchester) The environmental justice implications of nature-based solutions: a case study of Sponge City program in two Chinese cities
Anthony Jones (Durham University) Quantifying the hydrological implications of engineered log jams on large-scale reaches using controlled flow
Benjamin Graves (King's College London) Assessing the meltwater runoff of the Khumbu Glacier, Nepal, through stable isotope analysis
Konstantinos Alexopoulos (Scott Polar Research Institute) Quantifying snow change and its effects to water availability in the warming Greek mountains
Zhiqiang Zheng (The University of Manchester) Rural Transformations Within Infrastructure Corridors On The Edge of The Tropical Jungle: Livelihoods, Natural Resources, And Sustainability In Northern Laos
Stella Chiemela (University of York) Analysis of Linkages between Environmental Change, Conflict and Food Insecurity in Nigeria
Shadma Ahmed (University of Bristol) Studying Indian Muslim Women Activism: An Exploration of Gendered Religious Resistance in Contemporary Indi
Ziqiu Ren (University of Manchester) Filming Everyday Spatiotemporal Patterns: Food Markets as Infrastructural Nodes in Chinese Urban Context
Anu Jogesh (London School of Economics) “Values at Risk”: Examining climate-related financial risks and community vulnerability in India
Lucas Sebastián Worsdell (Coventry University) Co-innovation for Caribbean Agroecological Transitions (CiCAT)
Nina Djukanović (University of Oxford) “Green are Fields, Not Mines:” The Case of Lithium Mining in Serbia
Genia Hill (University of Oxford) Smallholder Perspectives of their food system activities: A key consideration for sustainable food systems transformation
Jasmin Rainero (Glasgow Caledonian University) Eliminating barriers to community energy projects in deprived communities: A just transition approach
Holly O'Donnell (University of Oxford) All that glitters is not gold: mapping the impacts of alluvial mining on mammal communities in the Peruvian Amazon and implications for ecosystem restoration
Zoe Gough (University of Southampton) Investigating the impact of environmental change on tropical montane bees and their pollination services
Emily Madsen (University of Oxford) Conflict amidst ecological shifts: the link between changing carnivore communities and Human-wildlife conflict.
Benjamin Ong (University of St Andrews) (Extra)ordinary natures: Reimagining environmental education in urban Malaysia
Francisco Garcia (University College London) Food movements and the right to the city
Anuschka Erkemeij (Birkbeck, University of London) Making home at the end of the world: survival strategies within home-making practices
Harish Shetty (Bath University) Understanding the Spatial Dynamics of Home and Work Among Migrant Construction Workers in India
Madeline Routon (University of Manchester) Making Home in the Margins: Creative Precarity and Placemaking in Barcelona
Crystal Ahiable (Royal Holloway, University of London) Measuring organic carbon inputs from fine-root production in UK wooded peatlands
Ella Wood (University of St Andrews) Investigating the Hydrological Significance of Rock Glaciers in the Kazakh Tien Shan
Ambreen Masud (Newcastle University) Integrating remote sensing with citizen science for urban flood risk analysis in Cartagena, Colombia
2023 recipients
Gopikaa Vijayakumar (University of Glasgow) Oxic methane production in Arctic Wetlands (OMPArc)
Elise Dehaen (University of Exeter) Hydraulic conductivity and litter production in Colombian peatlands: field measurements for improved peatland carbon modelling in JULES
Maria Mills (University of Leicester) Investigating the accuracy of stem respiration estimates: scaling methods, and vertical and diurnal variation
Prerna Bindra (University of Cambridge) The Aftermath: Human Implications of Conservation Related Relocations and the Institutions that Shape Them
Armando Caroca (University of Manchester) Unfolding the sacrifice zone: socio-spatial impact of mining waste deposits on urban areas in Chile
Sophie Manson (Oxford Brookes University) Quantifying the value of wildlife-friendly farming practices and their effect on ecosystem services in smallholder coffee farms in West Java, Indonesia
Eleanor Fox (University of Exeter) The relationships between mountain cryosphere change and water availability and use for communities in the semi-arid Chilean Andes
Brian Nalumenya (Coventry University) Strategies for sustainable water resources management in Uganda
Bruno Friedel (University of Oxford) The relationship between cohousing groups and land in a carbon and resource constrained world
Ihsan Abualrob (Durham University) Digitalising Archival Records: The British Council and Palestinians
Elliot Fisher (University of Edinburgh) The Isle of Fire: Making Sense of Fire In Madagascar’s Open Ecosystems
Camille Choquet (University of St Andrews) Conserving the tropical peatlands of the north Peruvian Amazon while supporting and improving the livelihoods of the people who live there: an analysis of the multi-level strategies
Cheng Fang (Durham University) Mobilising Global Financial Networks, Making the “China Concepts": Examining the Multi-scalar State Building in Chinese Companies' Oversees Listings
Louisa Brain (Queen Mary University of London) Navigating im/mobility and environmental change in Western Kenya
Neal Halforty (Queen's University Belfast) A Study of Neighbourhood Attachment and Place Identity in a Post Conflict Society: Portugese Communities in Northern Ireland
Catherine Clarke (University College London) The negotiation and implementation of area-based conservation targets in the Colombia Amazon
Rosie Lewis (University of Leeds) Assessing the health hazards of chronic exposures to volcanic gases on Montserrat, Eastern Caribbean
Hannah Runeckles (Newcastle University) Investigating geomorphological impacts of sand mining upon the Red River Delta, Viet Nam, and its communities
Alex Scoffield (University of Leeds) ENIGMA: Examining the physical conditions of a high-elevation Himalayan glacial lake
Charlotte Curry (University of Sheffield) Investigating the impacts of mining on glacier change in the central Chilean Andes
2022 recipients
Alejandra Pizarro Choy (University of St Andrews) The geopolitical ecology of conservation funding: Discourse and power in counter illegal wildlife trade programmes in Peru
Anna Stanworth (University of Exeter) Assessing ecosystem service provision from local to landscape scale in Papua New Guinea
Sophie Erfurth (University of Oxford) Institutional trust and collective action in groundwater user groups in Tunisia
Kenta Sayama (University of Oxford) Evaluating the importance of geocultural context for the conservation of Quaternary Palaeoenvironment Archives in Sharjah, UAE
Charlie Hackforth (University College London) Insect-mediated ecosystem functioning in Congolese Peat Swamp Forest: consequences of dung beetle activity on peat formation
Emma Underwood (Kingston University London) Parameterising range-shift predictions for mechanistic distribution models using demographic data in a Biodiversity Hotspot
Dhaval Joshi (University of Edinburgh) Peeping down, looking forward: exploring the knowledge(s) of groundwater governance in India
Emma Watts (University of Southampton) The 2018 rift eruption of Kilauea: Pyroclastic deposits and eruption dynamics of Fissure 8
Conner Morison (University of Edinburgh) Environmental and Societal Impacts of the 939 AD Eldgjá Fissure Eruption, Iceland
Juniper Kiss (University of Southampton) Swidden agriculture meets new soil etagenomics approach in Papua New Guinea
Matthew Beach (Queen Mary University of London) Connective tissues: (Un)lively materialities of gelatine and collagen
Natasha Mannion (Newcastle University) Understanding the role of hunting in mammal biodiversity responses to infrastructure expansion in the Heart of Borneo
Michael Wenborn (Oxford Brookes University) Scoping assessment of the challenges of co-existence of elephants and rural communities
Rosie Knowles (Royal Holloway, University of London) Re-imagining Liminal Therapeutic Landscapes
Rosemary Huck (University of Oxford) Quantifying soil crust erodibility in fragile semi-arid dune systems