Jennifer Sara is the Global Director for the World Bank Group’s Water Global Practice. Prior to taking on this position, Ms. Sara served for four years as Director, overseeing operational delivery in the Water Global Practice at the World Bank. She has over 30 years of experience working on global water issues, including overseas assignments for the World Bank as Sector Manager for Sustainable Development based in Hanoi, Vietnam (2010 – 2014); Sector Leader in Brazil (2006 – 2010); and Water and Sanitation Specialist in Bolivia (1990 – 1995). Ms. Sara leads the Practice’s senior management team, which drives policy direction, oversees a portfolio of $30 billion in water-related investments, conducts analytical work, and manages multi-donor trust funds and global partnerships. Under her leadership, the Water Global Practice supports an integrated approach to water security with a focus on sustaining water resources, delivering services and building resilience. The Water Global Practice team works across sectors to solve global water challenges and provides tailored operational support and policy advice to countries in response to specific needs and arising challenges. Ms. Sara holds an MSc in Environmental Management from the University of London, Wye College, and a BSc in Environmental Engineering from Brown University. She is Governor of the World Water Council and serves on the International Council of the American Water Works Association as well as the International Advisory Committee of the World Wildlife Fund’s Healthy Rivers for All Initiative.

Esha Zaveri is an Economist with the World Bank’s Water Global Practice with professional interests in water resource management, climate impacts, environmental health, and the use of geospatial data with statistical analysis to study interactions between the environment, and social and economic systems. She has published on these topics in leading academic journals and authored flagship reports of the World Bank on water scarcity (Uncharted Waters, 2017), water pollution (Quality Unknown, 2019), and migration (Ebb and Flow, 2021). Prior to joining the World Bank in 2018, she was a postdoctoral fellow at Stanford University’s Center on Food Security and the Environment where she remains an affiliated scholar.

Anders Jägerskog Ph.D is Snr Water Resources Management Specialist at the Global Water Practice at the World Bank. He is also the focal point at the World Bank for Transboundary Waters. His work focuses mainly on the Middle East and North Africa region but also covers East Africa including the Nile. Previously he was Counsellor for regional water resources in the MENA region at the Swedish Embassy in Amman, Jordan; Director, Knowledge Services, at the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) where he headed the Transboundary Water Management Unit and was work area leader for applied research. He managed the UNDP Shared Waters Partnership which facilitates and promotes dialogue and cooperation on transboundary water resources. He is Associate Professor (Docent) at Peace and Development Research, School of Global Studies, University of Gothenburg where his work focuses on global water issues. He worked for Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs; at the Embassy of Sweden, Nairobi and at Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). In 2003 he finished his PhD on the water negotiations in the Jordan River Basin at the Department of Water and Environmental Studies at the Linköping University, Sweden. He has published over 100 scientific articles, book chapters, debate articles and reports on global water issues.

Richard Damania is the Chief Economist of the Sustainable Development Practice Group. He has held several positions in the World Bank including as Senior Economic Advisor in the Water Practice, Lead Economist in the Africa Region’s Sustainable Development Department, in the South Asia and Latin America and Caribbean Regions of the World Bank. His work has spanned across multiple sectors and has helped the World Bank become an acknowledged thought-leader on matters relating to environment, water and the economy. Prior to joining the World Bank he held positions in academia and has published extensively with over 100 papers in scientific journals.

Dr. Marwa Daoudy is an Associate Professor of International Relations at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service (SFS) and the Seif Ghobash Chair in Arab Studies at the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies (CCAS). Dr. Daoudy’s research and teaching focus on critical security studies, climate change and environmental politics, International Relations, negotiation and mediation theory, water conflicts and Middle East politics. Her second book on The Origins of the Syrian Conflict: Climate and Human Security (Cambridge University Press, 2020) won the 2021 Harold and Margaret Sprout Prize by the International Studies Association, awarded for the best books in the field of environmental studies. Her first book The Water Divide between Syria, Turkey and Iraq: Negotiation, Security and Power Asymmetry (CNRS Editions, 2005) received the Ernest Lémonon Prize by the Institute of France at the French Academy (Académie Française). Amongst her other publications feature an article on ‘Water Weaponization in the Syrian Conflict: Strategies of Domination and Cooperation’ (International Affairs, 2020), a report titled ‘Syria’s Human Security is Inseparable from Its Environmental Health’ (The Century Foundation, 2020) and an article on ‘Rethinking the Climate–Conflict Nexus: A Human– Environmental–Climate Security Approach’ (Global Environmental Politics, 2021). Dr. Daoudy has collaborated with the UNESCO-World Water Assessment Program (WWAP), the UNESCWA (UN Social and Economic Commision for Western Asia, Beirut) and advised the United Nations Development Program (UNDP, Jerusalem) on Palestinian water rights in the Israel-Palestine peace and water negotiations.

Ruth Padel is an award-winning poet, Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, Professor of Poetry at King’s College London. She has published twelve acclaimed poetry collections; non-fiction on Greek tragedy and tiger conversation; and a novel focussing on wildlife conservation in India. Her new novel Daughters of the Labyrinth has the little-known Holocaust on Crete at its heart. ‘Historically informative story-telling, steeped in the history and folklore of Crete’ (Sunday Times). We Are All from Somewhere Else (2020), her meditation on migration, includes the crisis of refugees in the East Mediterranean. www.ruthpadel.com.