Mike FitzGibbon

Coming from a background in engineering and information systems in the electronics industry, I began work in development in the early 1990s in Tanzania. Returning to Ireland in 1996, I worked at both the International Famine Centre in UCC (later the Centre for Sustainable Livelihoods), and the statutory Higher Education Equality Unit until 2002. During this time, I worked as a development consultant in Ireland, leading and contributing to a range of projects in diverse areas from: the prevalence of asthma in marginalised communities, through gender equality in engineering education, to policy approaches to interculturalism in higher education. At this time, I also worked as an information systems consultant in sub-Saharan Africa. I joined the Department of Food Business and Development to work both in research and teaching in 2004; involvement in the development and delivery of the joint MSc in Rural Development with Mekelle University (Ethiopia) for most of the last decade was a most rewarding and challenging activity. I currently teach in UCC the areas of International Development, Conflict/Peace, Gender, Humanitarian Responses, Communications and Research Methodologies. Areas that I research include those of Food Insecurity / Smallholder Livelihoods, Value Chains, Gender, Conflict, the Media, ICTs, and in particular, Digital Data Gathering; all of these are focused mainly around impacts and consequences in low-income countries. During the last decade, my research and other development interests have included work in Ethiopia, Malawi, Lesotho, Uganda, Western Sahara, Sudan, Tanzania, Zambia, Kenya, and Afghanistan,as well as many European countries.

I also have a strong interest in human rights and development issues closer to home, particularly in relation to minority ethnic groups and other marginalised groups such as the asylum-seeking and other immigrant communities. I was party to the founding of two local non-governmental organisations, Nasc and Ethical Development Action, and have acted as director on these, and also with Cork Simon.