Areas of expertise
- Environmental Policy
- Managing Corporate Sustainability
- Natural Capital
- Waste Management and Resource Efficiency
Background
Dr Kenisha Garnett is an expert in futures analysis, strategic risk assessment, and stakeholder and public engagement. Her research focuses on developing robust foresight methodologies that link evidence-based strategic risk with value judgements to inform futures analyses, with a particular emphasis on assessing system resilience and the robustness of public sector policies and strategies. Her work supports policy organisations to better understand future challenges and opportunities and to translate foresight outputs into concrete actions.
Kenisha has led the development of medium- and large-scale scenario projects and delivered horizon scanning programmes for UK and international organisations, with a strong focus on the long-term sustainability of environmental and food systems. She works with organisations to develop strategic visions and roadmaps that identify policy options that perform best under desirable future scenarios, enabling decision-makers to champion plans for sustainability and innovation. Kenisha's expertise sits at the intersection of society and the environment, combining engineering and systems thinking with social science approaches and deliberative stakeholder engagement. Kenisha has extensive experience designing and delivering participatory processes that support inclusive decision-making, including engagement with diverse stakeholder groups. Recently, she has led interdisciplinary teams delivering foresight projects for the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO), the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), and the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE).
Kenisha has provided expert foresight advice to the UK Food Security Report 2024 and has served as a member of the European Food Safety Authority Expert Working Group on Emerging Risks in Food and Feed. She is a Member of the College of Experts at the Office for Environmental Protection and a Member of Defra鈥檚 Genetic Food Improvement Network Research Advisory Group. She is part of an international research consortium implementing annual cycles of the EU foresight system for the environment and is a member of the UK Government Office of Science / DSIT Futures Procurement Framework.
She holds a PhD in Waste Management Policy and Stakeholder Engagement, an MA in Social Science Research Methods, an MSc (Eng.) in Environmental Engineering and Project Management, and a BEng. in Civil Engineering.
Research opportunities
Long-term sustainability of complex systems (e.g. environment, food, science and technology, defence and security)
Futures, foresight, strategic risk assessment, stakeholder analyses
Emerging issues, trend analyses, tipping points and transformative change
Policy, strategy and organisational resilience.
Current activities
Ongoing and recent projects
2025. Conceptual framework for a semi-automated horizon scanning methology (case of AI risks and trends). Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT)
2024 - 2025. Shaping environmental policy in the pan-European region by applying foresight methodologies. United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE). Funded by the Geneva Science Policy Interface.
2023 - 2027. Futures Framework. Department for Science, Innovation and Technology / Go-Science.
2023. Co-Creating Strategy for UK-Thailand Cooperation in Science, Research and Innovation (SRI). National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA), Thailand.
2022 - ongoing. EU Foresight System for the Environment (FORENV) - annual horizon scanning cycles. Funded by European Commission (DG Environment).
2022 - 2026. NERC CENTA2 PhD studentship. Early warning system for food supply chain resilience to environmental disruption. Part-funded by UK Food Standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland.
2022 - 2025. Strategic foresight project. UK Government Agency.
2022 - 2025. NERC Knowledge Exchange Fellowship (job share). Identifying and delivering shared environmental solutions for plantation crops.
2022 - 2023. Future infrastructure implications. UK Government Agency.
2021 - 2022. Foresight for the Bio-circular Green Economy. Going Global Partnership Programme. Funded by British Council (Thailand).
2019 - 2020. Developing a research agenda on Foresight for Food in Thailand. Global Challenges Research Fund QR.
2019 - 2020. Decision tool to assess consequences of decisions implicit in future development plans: case of the Oxford-Cambridge Arc in the UK. Research England SPF.
2019 - 2020. Foresight for food; train the trainers project (Thailand). Food Innopolis. Funded through the British Council University-Industry Links Programme.
Clients
Recent
British Council Thailand
Food Innopolis
European Commission (DG Environment)
FCDO
Food Standards Agency / Food Standards Scotland
Previous
European Food Safety Agency (EFSA)
Defra
Environment Agency
Scottish Environmental Protection Agency
Natural Resources Wales
Welsh Government
CAMERAS
Syngenta
