Different backgrounds, one team.

With an earlier background in forensic archaeology—the science behind recovering evidence in criminal investigations, mass grave exhumations, and disaster victim identification—she has responded to major incidents and crises globally since 2011, working with affected families, governments, and companies in highly sensitive and high-pressure environments.

She is a researcher affiliated with the UCL Warning Research Centre, a member of the Santiago Network for Loss and Damage, a board member of the Holistic Wellness Initiative in South Sudan, a committee member of the Development Geographies Research Group of the Royal Geographical Society, and part of the Global Climate Resilience and Brain Health Project, coordinated by the Neuro Climate Working Group. She is also an advocate for the Indigenous Chagossian People (ICP).

Her work is grounded in Atlantic islands and coastal communities, where marine biodiversity, blue economy, and climate vulnerability converge with particular intensity and urgency. She is experienced in facilitating multi-stakeholder processes, integrating qualitative and quantitative approaches, and supporting the translation of scientific evidence into policy at local, national, and international scales.

Her practice is driven by a commitment to dialogue across ways of knowing. She designs processes that make space for complexity, cross-sector exchange, and community voices. Through art–science collaborations, she creates conditions for connecting researchers, artists, institutions, and communities across diverse geographical and cultural contexts.

Over the past decade, she has worked across Portugal, Cabo Verde, São Tomé and Príncipe, the United Arab Emirates and The Bahamas, supporting projects in conservation, education and community-led development. Her experience spans project management and implementation, participatory processes, stakeholder engagement, monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEAL), safeguarding, fundraising and partnership development.

Mafalda specializes in bridging strategy and implementation, translating complex challenges into practical and collaborative solutions. She has worked with local communities, governments, NGOs, schools and international organizations, facilitating dialogue, strengthening partnerships and supporting collective action in multicultural and rapidly changing environments. She has contributed to initiatives supported by donors including the European Union, Blue Action Fund, Arcadia, the Darwin Initiative and AECID.

Her work focuses on fostering meaningful participation and collaboration between people and institutions, helping organizations and communities address environmental and social challenges in ways that are inclusive, locally grounded and sustainable.

As the founder of the Yeheb Project, Muna works with local communities to conserve and domesticate Cordeauxia edulis (Yeheb), a wild food plant which is native to the area. Her method links the restoration of dryland ecosystems with the knowledge, priorities and sense of responsibility of the people who depend on them.

Muna also acts as a freelance focal point for Hargeisa Municipality in ICLEI Africa and in the LGMA Climate Adaptation Working Group, helping to promote city-driven climate action by means of knowledge dialogues and participatory decision-making, making use of cultural memory, community experience and collective learning.

She led learning and leadership training programs in the UK until July 2025; as co-developer of the Refugees as Re-Builders™ initiative, where she spent nine years designing and delivering training for displaced and diaspora professionals committed to rebuilding their home areas and enhancing community resilience.

Her commitment to tackling inequalities in the areas of health, the environment and livelihoods is supported by her previous work in public health, her doctoral research into phytochemistry and her brief postdoctoral positions at the UCL School of Pharmacy and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. The focus of her research was on the feasibility of underutilized dryland crops for food security, and throughout her career she has worked to enable communities to take part in shaping the decisions and practices that sustain their landscapes and futures.