John Janmaat

(He, Him, His)

Professor

Economics

Office: ART 255
Phone: 250.807.8021
Email: john.janmaat@ubc.ca

Research Summary

Environmental and resource economics, with an emphasis on the role of environmental services.

Courses & Teaching

Primary: Knowledge mobilization and sustainability policy; Environmental economics; Natural resource economics. Occasionally: Cost benefit analysis; Experimental economics; Development economics.

Biography

I grew up on a family dairy farm in Chilliwack.  Farming is inherently interdisciplinary, and on farms that are too small to divide tasks up between specialists, farmers must be knowledgeable in a variety of disciplines.  Being exposed to a variety of disciplines, and having the opportunity to work in the outdoors with natural systems, planted the seeds (and weeds) for my career path.

I tried to focus on single disciplines during my first years as an undergrad, but couldn’t see myself satisfied as a specialist in any of the fields I tried.  After four years, I ended up in the agriculture program at UBC, concentrating in agricultural economics.  Farmers make management decisions at the intersection between biological, climatic, geologic and human systems.  Agricultural economics seek to understand these decisions, and how changes in the policy environment can affect those decisions.

I followed the BSc in agricultural economics with an MSc in the same subject and then completed an MBA, which would have been valuable had my career path taken me back to that family farm.  Life events led me to choose the fork that lead to a PhD., with a concentration in environmental and resource economics naturally aligning with my interdisciplinary interests.

The needs of my family towards the end of my doctoral studies lead to a temporary job at Acadia University.  Temporary became permanent, and I spent seven years living in Wolfville, Nova Scotia.  In 2004 I learned about the plans for the future presence of UBC in Kelowna, with those plans emphasizing interdisciplinarity.  After two years of exploring this option, I was offered a position in 2006.  I arrived in Kelowna in 2007.

Education

Doctor of Philosophy, Queens University at Kingston, 2002
Econometrics; environmental and resource economics

Master of Business Administration, Simon Fraser University, 1996
Finance

Master of Science, The University of British Columbia, 1994
Agricultural Economics

Bachelor of Science, The University of British Columbia, 1992
Agricultural Economics

Websites

Please visit my website to learn more about me and my research.

Personal Website