Bio

Ibukunoluwa Kikelomo Akinola is a Ph.D Candidate at the Institute of African and Diaspora Studies (IADS), University of Lagos. Her research examines how climate change is reshaping the availability and diversity of medicinal plants in Nigeria’s forest reserves and what this means for African Traditional Medicine and community health resilience. Working across Nigeria’s rainforest and derived savannah ecological zones, she employs a mixed-methods approach to investigate the effects of climate change on traditional healing systems that remain a primary source of healthcare for many rural and low-income communities.

Akinola holds a Master of Arts in Philosophy from the University of Lagos and a Postgraduate Certificate in Education from the University of Nottingham. Her interests include African socio-political philosophy, climate justice, environmental ethics, bioethics, gender and decolonial thought. She has published in Wellcome Open Research and the Asian Journal of African Studies and has presented at international conferences, including the Oxford Global Health and Bioethics International Conference and the World Congress of Bioethics. Ibukunoluwa is a selected participant in the AFRETEC UNILAG Doctoral Academy 2.0 by Carnegie Mellon University Africa. She has contributed as a research assistant on EU-funded PAID project in Nigeria and other projects linking culture, health and community.