Oscar Morton

Research

I am broadly interested in conservation, and more specifically the wildlife trade and its potential to both harm species, and contribute to their conservation. I’m particularly interested in when and how data is used to ensure sustainability in the international legal wildlife trade.

I recently completed a PhD at the University of Sheffield focused on understanding the species-level impacts and patterns of the wildlife trade. This included assessing the state of knowledge on the impacts of trade on species abundance revealing how poorly understand the impacts of trade for many taxa are and using the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) trade database to model species-level temporal trends in species volumes through time.

My current work focuses on (1) developing model-based approaches to simulate sustainable quotas for CITES-listed species and (2) further unpicking how spatial and functional patterns of trade have changed through time. As the labs research data manager I also spend a lot of time collaborating with other researchers across a broad range of conservation topics including functional and phylogenetic diversity, payment for ecosystem services and expanding the utility of existing wildlife trade datasets.

About me

In my spare time, I am a keen foodie and enjoy cooking and baking with mixed success. When I get the chance, I love hiking in the peaks or further afield and often combine this with some refreshing wild swimming, usually with a book and my dog.