Dr. Yasuda is a Senior network & transboundary water cooperation specialist at Global Water Partnership. She supports GWP’s operations in Asia region, and also leads GWP’s thematic work on transboundary water. She is the lead faculty of the Massive Open Online Course on Governance Transboundary Freshwater Security (hosted by SDG academy), designed and directed the production of the course. Her area of expertise lies in the analysis of water and environmental governance, water diplomacy, political economy analysis surrounding natural resources management, with a focus on transboundary rivers and non-state actors’ engagements in natural resources management.
She works in a wide geographic areas including Asia, Africa, Middle East and Latin America, in program development, trainings on water governance and international water law, research, and supporting knowledge management and development. She also works to build capacity of countries to work on key sustainable development goals related to transboundary water, particularly through SDG 6.5.1 and 6.5.2 globally.
She was a postdoctoral researcher at the International Centre for Water Cooperation (under the auspices of UNESCO) hosted by SIWI, and the Hague Institute for Global Justice. She is a PhD graduate from the Centre for Water Law, Policy and Science at the University of Dundee (under the auspices of UNESCO). Her recent work focuses on analysing governance of transboundary rivers and non-state actors’ engagement in natural resources management, with focus on the Mekong River, The Brahmaputra River and the Lower Jordan River. Yumiko’s current professional work and research benefits from her prior experiences in working with water and environmental management globally while she worked for organizations including WWF, UNDP, Ericsson, and Mlup Baitong.