Sponsors: EDGES and the Program on Water Governance
What: informal student-driven dialogue with David Groenfeldt (by invitation)
Date: Thursday January 30th
David Groenfeldt
Director, Water-Culture Institute; Adjunct Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico
An anthropologist, David received his PhD in 1984 from the University of Arizona, based on field research on irrigation development in India. Most of his career has focused on international water issues, including five years with the International Water Management Institute in Sri Lanka and 13 years in Washington, DC working with consulting firms, and the World Bank, on water and natural resources policies in developing countries. Since 2002, David has focused on environmental and cultural aspects of water policies. He helped establish the Indigenous Water Initiative to coordinate inputs from Indigenous Peoples in the World Water Fora in Kyoto (2003) and Mexico City (2006). He was director of the Santa Fe Watershed Association, in Santa Fe, New Mexico (USA) from 2006 to 2009. He established the Water-Culture Institute in 2009 to promote the integration of Indigenous and traditional cultural values into water policies and practices. David is an Adjunct Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque. The Water-Culture Institute is a registered public charity incorporated in Santa Fe, New Mexico (USA) in July 2010. The Institute works both globally (Water Ethics Network) and locally (Rio Grande Governance Initiative) seeking to walk our talk, while recognizing that for the challenge of sustainable water policies, talk is also essential.