The Outstanding Young Researcher Awards (OYRA) are presented by the University annually to honour exceptional research accomplishments of young researchers (under the age of 40). Our Faculty is honoured to have two young researchers receiving OYRA for the year 2023-24 in recognition of their outstanding research:
Professor Austin M Strange
Associate Professor, Department of Politics and Public Administration
Professor Strange researches and teaches international relations and Chinese foreign policy. He is also a fellow in the National Committee on United States-China Relations Public Intellectuals Program. His research examines the nature and impacts of China’s historical and contemporary roles in international development, global infrastructure provision, and other foreign economic policy domains. His work has provided internationally impactful data and analysis on China’s overseas development finance. He and colleagues were among the first to develop comprehensive, systematic, and publicly available evidence on Chinese aid and lending across the Global South.
“I am extremely grateful to collaborate with hard-working, passionate, and sharp students and colleagues at HKU and beyond. As a researcher I aim to pursue research projects that are rigorous, accessible to broader audiences, and targeted at important but misunderstood real-world issues. These kinds of projects often have a high degree of difficulty, but if successful, can make positive knowledge impacts for a wide range of stakeholders.” – Professor Austin M Strange
Professor Zhenci Xu
Associate Professor, Department of Geography
Professor Xu is a human-environment researcher with focus on sustainable development goals, footprint, food-energy-water carbon nexus, ecosystem service, ecology, and China development. He is interested in taking a holistic approach to address the complexity of human-environment interactions and related sustainability issues such as sustainable development progress assessment, impacts of distant interactions on local sustainable development, and synergies and trade-offs between various kinds of ecosystem services.
“Receiving the Outstanding Young Researcher Award is an exciting honor. This is a great recognition that has inspired my research team and me. My research focuses on human-environment interactions, contributing to the promotion of global sustainable development. We explore holistic approaches to characterize environmental and socioeconomic interactions across spatial and temporal scales. By examining these interconnected systems, we can better understand the multifaceted challenges and opportunities that arise in the progress toward global sustainability. With my research team and researchers’ collaborations, we aim to amplify scholarly insights on global sustainable development through high-quality academic output. I hope our research will contribute to a more sustainable and equitable future.” – Professor Zhenci Xu
Join us in congratulating them on their outstanding contributions to academia!