Funded PhD Studentship - Mapping Sustainability Indicators

School of Land and Property Management
Faculty of the Built Environment
University of the West of England

Introduction

This three year full-time PhD studentship will investigate the mapping of 
sustainability indicators.  Working with Peter Wyatt from the University of 
the West of England and Steve Brammer from the University of Bath, in 
collaboration with Geofutures, a geographic information practice in Bath, 
this is an excellent opportunity to apply cutting edge GIS technologies to 
fundamental issues surrounding sustainable enterprise.

Research Project Overview

The UK Government has published sustainable development performance 
indicators at a national level for the past five years and last year began 
publishing these indicators at a regional level too.  As corporate social 
responsibility gains credence in the private sector these performance 
indicators will become an important information source for businesses 
seeking to identify suitable locations for their operations.  At the moment 
the indicators are not able to provide intelligence at the sub-regional or 
intra-urban level – a spatial scale at which business location decisions 
are ultimately made.

The PhD will begin by examining possible methods for mapping sustainable 
development performance indicators at a sub-regional level for the south 
west of England before investigating specific issue(s) that might arise.  
The PhD research will contribute to the overall aim to provide businesses 
with relocation and inward investment information that could supplement the 
typical information set that is referred to when choosing a new business 
location, such as access to raw materials, a suitable labour force, a 
market for the goods or services provided and the quality of the various 
communications infrastructures.  By providing additional intelligence that 
describes the relative sustainability performance of various locations, 
businesses will, at a minimum, be able to make environmentally informed 
location decisions and at best choose to locate their operation where 
sustainability performance is maximised.  

Geographical information systems (GIS) technology will be used to collate, 
store and visualise the indicators and spatial analytical techniques such 
as density mapping and geographical interpolation will be employed to 
extend their spatial range.  GIS will also be used to integrate what will 
be a diverse range of indicators into a composite index, perhaps adopting a 
similar approach as the Indices of Deprivation or the Town Centre Indices 
(http://www.odpm.gov.uk).  GIS will allow the index maps to be tailored 
depending on user-defined criteria so different types of business will have 
different ‘views’ of the data.

To summarise, the PhD student will investigate the technical issues 
surrounding the mapping of sustainable development performance indicators 
at a sub-regional level.  The objectives of the project will be to:

(a) Conduct a comprehensive review of the academic and professional 
literature relating to sustainable development and its relevance to 
corporate social responsibility and business (re)location in particular.  
This will provide the theoretical framework on which the methodology will 
be based;

(b) Identify, gather and collate the underlying data sets that are used 
to produce the Government’s sustainable development performance 
indicators.  These data sets will be supplemented with others, including 
those compiled by the South West Regional Observatory.  This will enable 
sub-regional data collation and analysis;

(c) Develop a framework for the analysis and visualisation of the data 
using a combination of multivariate statistical analysis techniques 
(cluster analysis, factor analysis) and GIS-based geo-statistical 
techniques (density mapping, interpolation);

(d) Devise an appropriate means of weighting the various indices 
depending on the business-user’s perspectives in order to construct 
different ‘views’ of the indicators.  This stage of the project will 
provide the feedback loop to (a), ensuring that the methodology 
incorporates the findings of the literature review and the needs of the end-
user.

Information for Candidates

The funding for this project has been provided as a result of a competition 
regionally and grants are made up of a mixture of funding from the South 
West Regional Development Agency, Geofutures and the University of the West 
of England, Bristol. This project will be subject to some confidentiality 
restrictions.  

You will be based at the University of the West of England, Bristol but 
some of your time (approximately one day per week) will be spent at 
Geofutues in Bath.  The University of the West of England prides itself on 
excellence in knowledge transfer and the development of professional 
practice.  At UWE this is characterised by a vast range of research, 
teaching, business expertise and advice to individuals and organisations in 
the local, national and international community.  We focus on:
• user-led, innovative research and consultancy 
• effective and long-lasting relationships with businesses, public 
services and communities. 
• teaching and learning for employability 
• continuing professional development for lifelong learning
Geofutures is a successful strategic consultancy calling on the disciplines 
of data analysis and geographic information modelling to create digital 
tools for major government and private sector clients.

We are seeking an enthusiastic and committed individual able to communicate 
clearly, both verbally and in writing.  You will have an upper second or 
first class honours degree and, ideally, you will have some experience of 
spatial analysis using standard GIS software such as ArcGIS or MapInfo.  
Indeed you may be a recent GIS Masters student.

Student fees will be paid and there will be a stipend of £12,300 for 2006/7 
and then annual increases thereafter.  A Research Training Grant of £750 
per annum will also be provided.

For information on how to apply and access to an online application form 
please visit www.built-environment.uwe.ac.uk/research.  If you wish to 
apply, please download and complete an application form making sure to 
include a short statement of around 500 words suggesting some lines of 
research inquiry.  The closing date for applications is 30th June, 2006.  
Short-listed applicants will be invited to an interview.

For further information about the studentship please contact Dr Peter Wyatt 
in the School of Land & Property Management, Faculty of the Built 
Environment, University of the West of England, BS16 1QY, by email at 
[log in to unmask] or by telephone on 0117 328 3080.  Alternatively, 
contact Carolyn Webb in the Faculty Research Office by email at 
[log in to unmask] or by telephone on 0117 328 3102.  You may also like 
to visit the Faculty’s web-site (www.built-environment.uwe.ac.uk) and the 
research pages in particular.

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