Marena Brinkhurst

I am a community planner and researcher focused on relationships between people and land. I work with land use planning, land policy, and land tenure and management systems to reduce conflicts over land and empower sustainable and equitable land use, especially with Indigenous and marginalized peoples.

Studying land issues abroad and volunteering with a First Nation in Ontario sparked my interests in land tenure and land management. I hope to use my research and work to assist communities within Canada and internationally to document, protect, design, and implement their own land tenure and management systems.

I am currently a junior community planner at Beringia Community Planning, a small Canadian firm that specializes in working with Aboriginal communities and supporting local capacity. I have a Masters of Resource Management (Planning) from the School of Resource and Environmental Management, Simon Fraser University and a B.Sc (Environment) in Environmental Economics and Policy, with a focus on land resources, from the University of Guelph.

My latest research project was in partnership with the Penticton Indian Band in British Columbia, Canada. We investigated the history, institutions, and land management implications of the on-reserve land tenure system created by the federal Indian Act, and in particular individual land-holdings on reserves.

I am interested in connecting with others in fields of land policy, land reform, land rights, land tenure and management systems, Indigenous lands, sustainable community development, and community capacity building.

“Knowing is not enough, we must apply. Willing is not enough, we must do.”
– Goethe

Photograph by Martin Schwalbe www.martinsphotography.ca

@Marena_B

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/marena-brinkhurst/33/141/247