Dr. Mzime Ndebele-Murisa (PhD; Biodiversity and Conservation Biology; University of the Western Cape, South Africa) is the Education Partnerships for Innovation in Communities (EPIC) Network Africa Regional Coordinator and a Program Specialist at START International.

She has over 20 years of experience in biodiversity conservation, natural resources management, regional and global environmental change, climate adaptation, and sustainability sciences. Before joining START and the EPIC Network, Mzime was based at the Chinhoyi University of Technology and the University of Zimbabwe. Here, she coordinated several multi- and trans-disciplinary, research and capacity building as well as learning teams in southern and East Africa focusing on aquaculture; climate change impacts modeling, and adaptation such as the SADC Aquaculture Mentorship Program; SADC Aquaculture Universities Network; Climate Impact Research Capacity and Leadership Enhancement (CIRCLE), CODESRIA’s Comparative Research Network and the Future Climate for Africa (FCFA)’s Future Resilience for African Cities And Lands (FRACTAL) project.

Mzime is well-versed in field-based research, using transdisciplinary co-production approaches. Mzime also has experience in project evaluation including emission footprinting and carbon evaluation across the African region. Currently, Mzime manages administrative projects and programs at START, and of interest is the EPIC Network. The EPIC model is a transformative, trans-disciplinary approach that seeks to foster resilience, sustainability, and innovation in addressing complex developmental issues in cities using participatory, inclusive approaches and ecosystem as well as student-based innovative learning and community-led adaptation, mitigation strategies, SDGs, and systems thinking among other innovations.

Mzime’s work is attested by over 40 peer-reviewed publications based on research conducted in the past two decades that include contributions to the IPCC Working Group II’s AR5 and AR6 reports as well as a Climate Smart Agriculture Manual for Zimbabwe.