Another Award for WIFO Economist Katharina Falkner

In addition to Katharina Falkner, Lisa Maria Rienesl's dissertation was also honoured. The prizes were bestowed at a ceremony organised by BOKU Rector Eva Schulev-Steindl and Reinhard Kern, Member of the Board of the Austrian Hail Insurance (Hagelversicherung).

"Their dissertations provide important contributions in the fields of livestock farming and plant cultivation. They have a very high practical relevance and contribute to the development of innovative solutions for challenges such as animal health and plant protection. This in turn improves risk prediction and minimisation for us as a specialist agricultural insurer. The BOKU sponsorship award is therefore not only a recognition of scientific achievements, but also a result of the good and important cooperation between science and practice," said Reinhard Kern at the award ceremony.

In her dissertation project, Falkner developed a statistical model to analyse the distribution and abundance of the Western Corn Rootworm in Austria. In the next step, she applied this model within an integrated modelling framework, i.e., in combination with other disciplinary models, such as a climate model and an economic optimisation model, to analyse the economic and ecological effects of crop rotation diversification as an alternative pest control measures to pesticide applications. In order to take uncertainties with regard to future climate conditions into account, she performed the analysis for three climate scenarios. The work was supervised by Erwin Schmid and Hermine Mitter (both BOKU Vienna, Institute for Sustainable Economic Development) as well as Elena Moltchanova (University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand).

Katharina Falkner has been working as an economist in the research group "Climate, Environmental and Resource Economics" at WIFO since 2022. She is also a research associate at the Institute for Sustainable Economic Development at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna (BOKU), where she completed her doctoral studies in social and economic sciences in 2022. Her research interests include (agricultural) climate change adaptation and mitigation, environmental economics, sustainable development, and sustainable land use. On a methodological level, her research focus is on quantitative research approaches and integrated land use modelling. Her professional experience includes participation in national research projects (ACRP, ÖAW, StartClim) and teaching at BOKU Vienna. After her bachelor studies in Environmental and Bioresource Management at BOKU Vienna, she completed her master studies in Agricultural and Food Economics (focus on: Agricultural and Food Policy, Regional Development and Rural Sociology). During her research work at BOKU Vienna, she spent a research period at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand.