PhD in Sustainable forest management, University of Valladolid

Forestry Engineer, Polytechnic University of Madrid

Master in Agroecology, University of Cordoba

She has worked for CSIC, IRTA and CREDA

Her main research lines focus on the social sustainability of forest and agrarian systems:

·         Economic valuation of ecosystem services and environmental externalities

·         Analysis of citizens’ attitudes, values and behaviour towards forest and agrarian systems

·         Design and implementation of Payments for Environmental Services (PES)

·         Assessment of livelihood and adaptation strategies pursued by smallholders in face of global change

·         Assessment of objectives, attitudes and behaviour of forest owners and farmers

·         Assessment of consumer behaviour

·         Selection and assessment of social sustainability indicators (S-LCA)

Varela, E., Pulido, F., Moreno, G., Zavala, M.A. (2020) Targeted policy proposals for managing spontaneous forest expansion in the Mediterranean. Journal of Applied Ecology 57: 2373-2380.

Govigli, V. M., Górriz-Mifsud, E., Varela, E. (2019) Zonal travel cost approaches to assess recreational wild mushroom picking value: Trade-offs between online and onsite data collection strategies. Forest Policy and Economics 102: 51-65

Kallas, Z., Varela, E., Candek-Potokar, M., Pugliese, C., Cerjak, M., Tomazin, U., Karolyi, D., Aquilani, C., Vitale, M., Gil, J.M. (2019) Can innovations in traditional pork products help thriving EU untapped pig breeds? A non-hypothetical discrete choice experiment with hedonic evaluation. Meat science 154: 75-85

Díaz-Montenegro, J., Varela, E., Gil, J.M. (2018). Livelihood strategies of cacao producers in Ecuador: Effects of national policies to support cacao farmers and specialty cacao landraces. Journal of Rural Studies 63: 141-156.

Varela, E., Górriz-Mifsud, E., Ruiz-Mirazo, J., López-i-Gelats, F. (2018). Payment for targeted grazing: Integrating local shepherds into wildfire prevention. Forests 9: 464

Varela, E., Kris Verheyen, Alicia Valdés, Mario Soliño, Jette B. Jacobsen, Pallieter De Smedt, Steffen Ehrmann, Stefanie Gärtner, Elena Górriz, Guillaume Decocq (2018) Promoting biodiversity values of small forest patches in agricultural landscapes: Ecological drivers and social demand. STOTEN (619-620): 1319-1329.

Varela, E., Jacobsen, J.B., Mavsar, R. (2017) Social demand for multiple benefits provided by Aleppo pine forest management in Catalonia, Spain. Regional Environmental Change 17(2): 539-550