"Knowledge is experience and by sharing experience we can work towards a better future for generations to come. Being a recipient of the Oxford Wakefield Graduate Scholarship at Christ Church has enabled me to access teaching from world-leading experts in the field of Water Science, Policy, and Management. Importantly this opportunity has allowed me to collect a wealth of experience from students, teachers, and even coffee-shop conversations which I can bring back to Aotearoa-New Zealand and share.
We face a critical point in time where the management of our water supplies has become an increasingly important task. The eutrophication of waterways, over-abstraction of groundwater, loss of ecological diversity and habitat, complex interplay between rights and use, these are all relevant components of water management which require international perspectives and collaboration to solve. How can we finance years of underinvestment to water infrastructure and internationally support universal access to water in line with the Sustainable Development Goals while balancing the need to enact sustainable policies which target industry pollution at a global scale? Green-growth? De-growth? These are questions which need answers.
I cannot be more grateful for the Wakefield Graduate Scholarship which has opened the conversation for me and allowed me to formulate tangible solutions at an international level to begin answering these questions."