Phumlani Nzuza has ended the year on a high with the successful defence of his PhD on Friday 5 December at Ghent University in Belgium. He is the first FABI student  to complete a joint PhD between Ghent University's Faculty of Bioscience Engineering and FABI’s Satellite Lab in Remote Sensing of Plant Health at the University of Pretoria. Many of Phumlani’s FABI colleagues and friends had the pleasure of joining his online presentation “Detection of Gonipterus damage in Eucalyptus plantations in South Africa using UAV and satellite remote sensing”

His supervisors were Prof. Wouter Maes (Ghent University), Prof. Bernard Slippers and Dr Michelle Schröder from FABI. The examiners for his thesis were: Prof. Pascal Boeckx, Prof. Patrick De Clercq and Prof. Frieke Vancoillie (all of the Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University), Prof. Anna Bosman, Faculty of Engineering, University of Pretoria, FABI’s Prof. Almuth Hammerbacher and Prof. llaria Germishuizen from the Institute for Commercial Forestry Research at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.

Phumlani’s dissertation research focused on developing novel methods for the detection and monitoring of invasive insect pests in Eucalyptus plantations, integrating geospatial and remote sensing technologies. The outcomes offer forest managers a important  tool for timely intervention, directly contributing to more sustainable and resilient forest management practices.