Laura van Bellen Researcher & Advisor

Laura van Bellen works at DRIFT as a researcher and advisor across various domains, with a focus on agriculture, the food system, and biodiversity. She has experience guiding learning trajectories and doing reflexive monitoring on diverse topics such as biobased building and community engagement in the cultural sector. She has also worked on various transition analyses and evaluations related to agriculture and spatial planning. In her work, she is always looking for ways to translate big dreams into small, manageable steps amidst the complexity of transition challenges. Her approach is creative, curious, and investigative, often drawing inspiration from nature or the arts.

She previously completed a bachelor's degree in Nanobiology at TU Delft and then earned a master's degree in Resilient Food and Farming Systems at Wageningen University. During her master's, she explored food systems and agriculture in a broad sense. For instance, she wrote a thesis on the impact of community gardens in multicultural neighborhoods and did research on the ecological, social, and economic effects of the transition to regenerative agriculture. She also participated in the National ThinkTank, where she focused on biodiversity loss, which led to her current initiative of setting up a circular seed bank for farmers.

In her free time, she enjoys trying out recipes from her extensive collection of cookbooks, venturing into nature with her tent, and has recently discovered a hidden talent for pottery.