Water and Food Security PIRE

How do relationships between scientists, farmers, water managers, and authorities influence the production, dissemination, and outcome of new scientific knowledge? This project establishes an international research and education partnership to promote a political-institutional model of science that links sociological and engineering methods in a people-centered approach to the human-climate-water-agriculture-energy nexus in the Blue Nile basin (BNB), Ethiopia.

The project is a multi-year collaborative endeavor that will run from 2016 to 2021. By the end of the project, the research team will have crafted state-of-the-art tools to help small holder farmers make practical decisions about water, crops and fertilizers and ultimately gain more secure access to food and water in the face of increasingly challenging climatic extremes. Learn more

The UConn PIRE project brings people and resources together across disciplinary, cultural, and geographical boundaries to promote knowledge-driven and rights-based interventions that enhance food and water security in vulnerable settings. We promote a political-institutional model of science that links sociological and engineering methods for a people-centered approach. Our political-institutional approach integrates graduate and undergraduate education, professional training, and community outreach into the research program to develop the human capital and social connections between all stakeholders—scientists, farmers, policymakers and students in the United States and in Ethiopia. The project achieves its objectives through:

Prof. Emmanouil N. Anagnostou

PIRE Principal Investigator
Director, Eversource Energy Center
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Connecticut
Email: manos@uconn.edu