People

Amy Pieterse

  • Role in Center:

    Junior Researcher

  • Discipline:

    Urban Planning

  • University:

    University of Pretoria

  • Country:

    South Africa

Biography: Amy Pieterse is an Urban Planner and researcher working in South Africa. She completed her Master’s in Town and Regional Planning at the University of Pretoria, in which she explored the extent to which local governments’ mainstream climate change adaptation into planning. She is currently pursuing her Ph.D., and on a 6-month research stay at the Global Center of Spatial Methods for Urban Sustainability (GCSMUS) at TU Berlin to develop her proposal. She has a specific research interest in how local governments take-up research and evidence into planning and policy, with a focus on climate resilience. She holds a Senior Researcher position in the Smart Places Cluster at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR). She has been with the CSIR since 2014 and works as part of an interdisciplinary research and development team, conceptualising and developing innovative approaches to addressing and understanding complex urban problems.

Research Topic: Research uptake in support of evidence-based urban planning

Selected Publications:

  • Pieterse, A./Du Toit, J./Van Niekerk, W. (2020): Climate change adaptation mainstreaming in the planning instruments of two South African local municipalities. Development Southern Africa, 0(0), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/0376835X.2020.1760790

  • Pieterse, A./Van Huyssteen, E./Van Niekerk, W./Le Roux, A./Napier, M./Ndaba, D./ Mahlelela, S. (2016): Aligning and Targeting Spatial Investment: Exploring Assumptions, Accomplishments and Challenges, Working paper, CSIR, Pretoria.

  • Van Niekerk, W./Le Roux, A./Pieterse, A. (2019): CSIR launches novel online climate risk profiling and adaptation tool : the Green Book. South African Journal of Science 115. 1–3. https://doi.org/10.17159/sajs.2019/6238

Areas of Expertise:

  • Climate Change Adaptation
  • Climate Change Response and Resilience Mainstreaming
  • Spatial Planning
  • Planning Policy and Policy Analysis