Water Security in India Conference

April 15 - 18, 2009

The Columbia Water Center held a special event on Water Security in India. The event was co-sponsored by the Asia Society and the South Asia Institute at Columbia University. Water is fundamental to food and energy security in South Asia and the region faces significant water scarcity in the face of a rapidly growing population and a changing climate. Our event highlighted the potential factors inducing concerns with water scarcity in the region and fostered a focus on potential public and private solutions to the emerging concerns.

White Papers
Forms and Documents
PowerPoint Presentations
Participant Bios

Wednesday, April 15th at the Asia Society

Water Security in India Panel Discussion

At an event co-hosted by the Asia Society and the Columbia Water Center, a distinguished panel of experts came together on Wednesday, April 15, 2009, the first day of the four-day conference looking at the emerging water crisis in India. Alok Sikka, a Secretary in India’s Ministry of Agriculture, opened the conference with his talk, “Water Security in India.” Sikka discussed the water scarcity faced by the nation, focusing on agriculture and the inefficiencies (in crop choice, water use, and weather forecasting) facilitated by current institutions in place. With more effective management, however, he was optimistic that the situation could be improved. He proposed solutions, both economic and non-economic, to produce more food with less water, improve the productivity of the system as a whole, and make the most of scarce water resources.

Sikka’s talk was followed by responses from fellow panelists Abhiram Seth, Andrew Robertson, and David Ludden. The panelists discussed post-Independence history, water-pricing and subsidy options, seasonal monsoon prediction possibilities, groundwater use, and how these different factors could be studied and changed to positively affect water-use in India.

Click here for a longer summary
Click here for Sikka's Presentation
Click here for Robertson's Presentation

Thursday, April 16th at Columbia University

Upmanu Lall, Professor of Engineering at Columbia University and Director of the Columbia Water Center, opened the second day of the conference with an overview of the current water situation in India. Lall detailed the many different cultural and governmental problems that India faces, posed possible venues to a multi-disciplinary solution, laid out desired outcomes, and went over the specific goals for the rest of the conference.

Click here for a longer summary
Click here for Lall's Welcome Presentation

Panel on Perspective on Water Issues in India

Peter Rogers and John Briscoe, along with moderator Casey Brown, formed the panel on Perspective on Water Issues in India. The panel brought up issues such as how to introduce infrastructure, influence governance of water policy, and improve water-use management. Rogers looked specifically at the challenge of a former colony in changing their agricultural momentum, post-Independence, away from famine-prevention, and towards instead economic viability and environmental sustainability. Briscoe looked at a variety of case-studies, from Australia to India to Bhutan, focusing on water rights and how and whether it is possible to maintain production while dramatically decreasing water-use.

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Panel on Perspective on Use of Climate Information to Guide Water Managment and Development

Andrew Robertson, Praveen Kumar, and Sankar Arumugam and moderator Balaji Rajagopalan formed the second panel of the day, Perspective on Use of Climate Information to Guide Water Management and Development. The panel focused on defining uncertainties in climate information, the predictability of monsoonal seasons, and the reliability of existing forecasting models.

Click here for a longer summary
Click here for Arumugam's Presentation
Click here for Robertson's Presentation
Click here for Rajagopalan's Presentation
Click here for Kumar's Presentation

Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute and Professor of Sustainable Development at Columbia’s School of International Public Affairs, gave a talk on the integration, management and practical implementation of the complex issues surrounding water development strategies. Water, he argued, is the most difficult development issue facing the world right now: there is no easy substitute for water when it is not there, so the fight is at least a cold war if not a hot war. Sachs called for an integrated, scientific and geography-based, ground-up modeling not often done by specialists who limit themselves to one field.

Click here for a longer summary

Panel Perspective on Agriculture, Water, and Impacts on Livelihoods

Kamal Vatta and Sebastian Morris, along with moderator Vijay Modi, formed the panel on the Perspective on Agriculture and Water and Impacts on Livelihoods. The panel focused on how to simplify subsidy structuring, how to most effectively incentivize sustainable and economically viable behavior, and the best way to achieve a better water- and energy-use trajectory.

Click here for a longer summary
Click here for Modi's Presentation
Click here for Vatta's Presentations
Click here for Morris' Presentation

Friday, April 17th at the Asia Society

Strategies for Risk Management in Agricultural Production to Improve Water Productivity

Jerry Skees, Alok Sikka, Peter Rogers, Abed Khalil and moderator Daniel Osgood formed the panel on Strategies for Risk Management in Agricultural Production to Improve Water Productivity. The panel looked at the best ways to mitigate production and market risks while still incentivizing sustainable and energy-efficient behavior in the agricultural sector.

Click here for a longer summary
Click here for Osgood's Presentation

Future Role of Public-Private Partnerships in the Context of Sustainability and Profitability of Agricultural Production/Resources

Abhiram Seth, Alok Sikka, Bruce Kahn and Tim Huh formed the panel on the Future Role of Public-Private Partnerships in the Context of Sustainability and Profitability of Agricultural Production/Resources. The panel looked at the best strategy to determine roses and needs of policy changes that would encourage appropriate private sector opportunity for investment.

Click here for a longer summary

Pilot Subsidy Reform Program

Vijay Modi presented a straw-man proposal for a pilot subsidy reform program that would aim to reduce water use while remaining transparent and administratively simply. The main question to be answered was the following: In a small area (of 300 to 1000 farmers), can a program of subsidy reform be shown to be possible in which, compared to the current system, implementation leaks are less and ownership of ideas among farmer groups and the government is more?

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Saturday, April 18th at Columbia Unviersity

Upmanu Lall, Professor of Engineering at Columbia University and Director of the Columbia Water Center, opened the conference’s final discussion with a talk on attaining “SIDHI,” or Sustainable Income per Drop of H2O in India. Lall focused on if and how India can go from being a country plagued by severe water crisis, to one leading global agricultural production and marketing. Of the many possible routes to reducing India’s water-use—through technology, crop selection, subsidy mechanisms, and information modeling—each has economic and political costs, as well as differing levels of uncertainty in implementation. The question remaining is how to offset those costs, and introduce sustainable water use even while dealing with growing populations, relative poverty levels, societal fragmentation, and climate shocks.

Click here for a longer summary
Click here for Lall's wrap-up Presentation

White Papers

Click on any of the papers below to learn about the issues discussed at the conference:

Columbia Conference on Water Security in India Brief
Concept Note on Water Security in Gujarat
Concept Note on Water Security in Telangana, Andhra Pradesh
Concept Note on Water Security in Punjab
Subsidy Note on Water Value

Forms and Documents

If you plan to seek reimbursement for your expenses, please save your receipts. Always ask your taxi driver for a receipt.
Detailed reimbursement instructions
Check Request Form for Columbia University
W-9 Form, Request for Taxpayers
W-8BEN Form, Foreign Status
Non-Employee Expense Sheet

PowerPoint Presentations

****** Pictures courtesy of Elsa Ruiz and Billy Swersey at the Asia Society

Wednesday, April 15th at the Asia Society

Water Security in India Panel Discussion

At an event co-hosted by the Asia Society and the Columbia Water Center, a distinguished panel of experts came together on Wednesday, the first day of the four-day conference looking at the emerging water crisis in India. Alok Sikka, a Secretary in India’s Ministry of Agriculture, opened the conference with his talk, “Water Security in India.”

In his talk, Sikka described the disproportionate water availability across Asia and India. Asia claims within its borders 60% of the world’s people, but has access to only 36% of its water. India has an even more disproportionate allotment, with 4% of the world’s water to be shared among 16% of the world’s people. When broken down to the per-capita level, this disparity results in an availability of 1700 cubic meters of water per person per year in India (compared to N America 15000, and world 6700).

Sikka went on to illustrate the ways in which water and humanity are inseparable—water is intricately involved with means of livelihood, getting rid of poverty, providing security against floods and other extreme weather events, and providing food and water security. With its limited water resources, not to mention its difficult-to-predict monsoon seasons, India faces many inherent challenges in making efficient use of its available water. Add to this widespread poverty, and policy institutions which have been in place for only 60 years (since India’s Independence), and it becomes clear that India’s water situation will demand more and more immediate attention if it is to avoid nation-wide water crisis.

Since 85% of the country’s water resources go towards agriculture, this was an appropriate focal point of the evening, and Sikka discussed options as to where to begin any future water policy implementations or technology changes. The issues at stake are varied: crop-choice (based either on geography, or the introduction of genetically modified water-efficient, or even drought-resistant, crops), the introduction of irrigation or farming technology, the regulation of energy and groundwater use, the prediction of seasonal weather patterns, and the viability of the current governmental subsidy programs.
Unfortunately, one of the more valuable crops is also the most water-intensive—rice. For various reasons, often the areas growing the most rice are paradoxically among the most water-scarce, resulting in an inefficient situation in which the water-scarce areas are exporting food and the water-rich areas are importing. In addition, among a variety of crops (rice, maize, wheat), there is a large gap between potential and actual productivity. Another problem faced by Indian farmers is the seasonal monsoon, which results in much of the annual precipitation falling during the months of June and July—making both irrigation and storage imperative for reliable agricultural production of year-round crops.

If we do nothing, Sikka predicted the probability of declining per capita land and water availability, steeply depleting aquifers, depleting and degrading natural resources, and stagnating yields. With more effective management, however, he was optimistic that the situation could be improved. He proposed solutions, both economic and non-economic, to produce more food with less water, improve the productivity of the system as a whole, and make the most of scarce water resources. Economic solutions included water pricing and energy subsidy changes; and non-economic solutions included improving efficiency of rainwater harvesting, introducing new irrigation technologies especially designed for small land-owning farmers, increasing the sharing of group resources like tubewells.

Sikka’s talk was followed by responses from fellow panelists Abhiram Seth, Andrew Robertson, and David Ludden. The panelists echoed many of Sikka’s statements, and also discussed post-Independence history, water-pricing and subsidy options, seasonal monsoon prediction possibilities, groundwater use, and how these different factors could be studied and changed to positively affect water-use in India.

Abhiram Sethlike Sikka, focused his response on water in the agriculture industry. One of the first issues Seth discussed was the problem of poor crop-choice across India. Rice paddy globally consumes about 26% of water resources, and in India it is more likely closer to 40%. Introduction of simple and inexpensive or free technologies can cut significantly on this water use (up to 50%), and farmers can alternatively choose to raise a different, less water-intensive crops. He brought up the possibility of a support price system which would preference wheat over rice in a water-scarce area like Punjab. Corn, also, would be a more appropriate crop choice for the region, as the area consumes a lot of corn due to its relatively high per capita income levels and the resulting abundance of poultry. The important thing, Seth stressed, was that any changes must reach the poor farmers at the bottom if they are to work on the macro scale across the country.

Seth also discussed industry’s role in embarking upon maintaining “positive water balance”—by working to counteract their water-use through initiatives like making potable water available at the community level or supporting water-saving technologies. Leveled fields, for instance, can save 20-25% of water use, and a while a water-leveler is out of the budget of a small individual farmer, it could easily by bought by larger industrial companies who wanted to contribute to water in agriculture. Another opportunity for investment is algae harvesting for energy. The algae require limited resources, maintain large growth rates, are 70-80% fresh water, and high in nutrients; theoretically, a farmer working on harvesting algae could produce enough water for 30-40 families.

Andrew Robertson, Research Scientist at the International Research Institute for Climate and Society, discussed the role climate-prediction models and weather patterns. The ability to anticipate and predict monsoons, India’s yearly season of heavy rainfall, has been sought since the great El Nino of 1790-91. Each year, the monsoons bring heavy rain in the north during the summer, and in the south during the winter; further, more specific, prediction becomes more difficult, however, due to smaller regional differences, making agriculture management very difficult. One prediction method Robertson discussed was the correlation between ocean temperature (on the El Nino and La Nina scale) and monsoonal droughts and fluctuations.

David Ludden, Professor of Political Economy and Globalization in the Department of History at New York University, discussed the historical role of water in India. He talked about the importance of considering water to be a natural and not national phenomenon, and the post-Independence partition which made that a difficult principle to realize. Since 1947, India has seen major institutional change in ways of ensuring security and economic well-being—including improved living conditions, the creation of a national economy, the introduction of price-supports and many state- and nation-supported subsidy programs. While the economy has grown exponentially during this time, however, reforms were slower to move into the agricultural sector; the separation between the private sector and agriculture has protected Indian farming from the current financial situation, but has also kept its growth disproportionately low in the major GDP shifts the country has seen in the last 20 years. Ludden concluded with a call to reversing outdated historical inheritances, especially that of privileging richer, more politically-connected parts of the population in water allocation.

Thursday, April 16th at Columbia University

Upmanu Lall, Professor of Engineering at Columbia University and Director of the Columbia Water Center, opened the second day of the conference with an overview of the current water situation in India. Lall detailed the many different cultural and governmental problems that India faces, posed possible venues to a multi-disciplinary solution, laid out desired outcomes, and went over the specific goals for the rest of the conference.

Lall called for the introduction of a dynamic approach to modeling future solutions to India’s diverse and connected problems. Before isolating water as a single issue, many other parts of the equation must be considered. Population, as well as per capita needs for food and other resources, is increasing. Sustainability demands a rate of growth related to the productivity of the resource (like groundwater), and the ability to meet demands of the resource, across a demographic and geographic area, must be reasonable to assume. It is also important to insure that the losses incurred (due to climate, economic, or other factors) are contained to low probability.

Looking towards possible solutions to these complex problems, Lall talked about many options in both public- and private-sector venues. In the public sector, policy initiatives like support-pricing and subsidies (in energy or other inputs) can be used to incentivize water efficiency. He also talked about the possibilities of extension programs (such as the Green Revolution), the introduction of crop selection, the implementation of better irrigation technology and practices, the use of information-based regional targeting, the increase of infrastructure development and management (of surface water and groundwater access, reliability, and resilience), and the development of climate-prediction models. Developing a private-sector role in the agro-water supply chain, in issues of production, income stability, and environmental protection, is also an important part of the equation.

Under any of these models, the goals remain relatively similar: food self-sufficiency and effective resource aggregation and procurement; reduced exposure to climate and market-price risk; reversal of groundwater depletion trends, as well as cross-sectoral impacts of water and energy use; management improvement in storage strategies, as well as regulation of water-use during periods of drought (through price-structuring or other options); improvement of use-efficiency to offset the growth of demand; and the development of a model which accommodates both climate and human behavior.

Panel on Perspective on Water Issues in India

Peter Rogers and John Briscoe, along with moderator Casey Brown, formed the panel on Perspectives on Water Issues in India. The panel brought up issues such as how to introduce infrastructure, influence governance of water policy, and improve water-use management.

Moderator Casey Brown opened the panel with an introduction of the themes to be addressed in the panel. One theme was managing variability—in both climate and precipitation extremes—and its effects on the economy. Another was the challenge in translating good ideas into workable policy. The final theme encompassed the complications of a transition from pervasive low-value water-use (such as in sustenance agriculture) to a world where water is put to only high-value uses.

Peter Rogers, Professor of Environmental Engineering at Harvard University and author of the recent book, An Introduction to Sustainable Development, looked at India’s colonial history and its lasting impact on the country’s water strategy. While agriculture in India in the 19th century was by far one of the most progressive, especially in the case of irrigation methods, colonial rule slowly transformed the nation’s agricultural goals towards famine prevention (a tool to prevent rebellion) and away from economic viability. Irrigation today still persists mainly as famine-relief, which leads to water being spread very thin so as to be everywhere at once. Rainfall harvesting can be improved, as can foreign policy initiatives in managing international negotiations surrounding the sharing of water coming down from the Himalayan Mountains.

John Briscoe, Professor of the Practice of Environmental Health at Harvard University and former Senior Water Advisor for the World Bank, focused on issues of water rights, and how claims on such rights affect investment in water infrastructure as well as management of the resources. So many factors are important when considering a water resource, and how to more efficiently manage it, whether it be national or international. Even such basics as water quality and pollution control need to be addressed in India, notably along the Ganges River. In addition to this, there is a need for universal and clearly defined rights system, such as the ones in Majarastra and Punjab, which would give farmers both a predictability of water rights and an ability to trade them. Governmental or community-run systems must manage irrigation and groundwater use, as well as regulate the implementation of appropriate water-efficient infrastructure (such as hydropower, which Briscoe argued was an important component of current Indian agricultural movement). Lastly, management of both climate change and existing climate variability can be greatly improved using existing climate-prediction modeling technology. Citing Victoria, Australia, as a case-study, Briscoe also argued that water-use reduction can be reached while maintaining economic productivity—over the last ten years, Victoria has decreased its water use by 70% and maintained equal production.

Panel on Perspective on Use of Climate Information to Guide Water Managment and Development

Andrew Robertson, Praveen Kumar, and Sankar Arumugam and moderator Balaji Rajagopalan formed the second panel of the day, Perspective on Use of Climate Information to Guide Water Management and Development. The panel focused on defining uncertainties in climate information, the predictability of monsoonal seasons, and reliability of existing forecasting models.
Andrew Robertson, Research Scientist at the International Research Institute (IRI) for Climate and Society, opened this panel with a talk on seasonal monsoon forecast models. In many places, access to accurate forecasting for any particular season can be limited. Robertson talked about current IRI projects on extended-range forecast systems for climate management and agriculture, and the goal of making forecasts that are more useful to yearly agricultural decision-making. Models must be both probabilistic and “tailored,” as well as easily applied to real agricultural situations. Such models would make optimal use of historical information (the number of dry spells longer than a certain length, for example, or the probability of exceeding three such spells in a season). The IRI is also working to try to predict a statistic of rainfall—number of dry days, or dry spells—which could then be run into a crop or hydrologic model, using maps of daily sequences as a base. These types of climate distribution models could be used in absence of accurate forecasts in certain areas.

Balji Rajagopalan gave a talk on monsoon rainfall variations and their implications for agriculture and water management. Rajagopalan, like Robertson, admitted that forecasts—using those of the last 20 years as examples—are often poor representations of reality. It is thus important to list and track the specific rainfall attributes that are most relevant for resource planning. Specifically, he looked at a study which looked at the correlation between land use and precipitation. Using NDVI trends maps, Rajagopalan noted that a significant increase in vegetation (mostly coming from the introduction of extensive irrigation) during the months of March, April, and May tends to lead to decreased rainfall in July. Information like this can guide policy makers to make decisions that increase sustainability. Another option for poly makers to is to look at trends in deficits and weather sequences over the last fifty years to move the growing of certain crops from one place to another based on available resources.

Praveen Kumar echoing Upmanu Lall’s call for multidisciplinary research, called for a varied and comprehensive approach when looking at India’s water problems. Kumar noted the existence of a combination of inevitable as well as created problems leading to the current water crisis—these include population increase, economic growth and development, infrastructure implementation and water works development to support the Green Revolution, pollution management, and climate change. A major challenge to sustainable solutions is the lack of multidisciplinary data and adequate coverage. Management officials are often too quick to underestimate the strength of weak links in the water-use system, hastily delineating system boundaries based on limited historical data. In creating a multidisciplinary approach, it will be important to think beyond the realm of the observed, and into the realm of the possible. One step to tackle this problem would be to indentify thresholds and tipping points. This could be done scientifically through the accumulation of data and methods for change-detection, attribution and prediction; identification of when change becomes irreversible; and the assessment of risks, vulnerabilities and resilience. Through technology, Kumar posed that it was necessary and possible to maximize value per drop of water. Through the field of economics, water-pricing and ecohydrologic services can be mobilized. On the social side, human rights, justice and equity must be kept in mind. Conservation, recycling, and sustainability must also remain at the forefront. Governmentally, there must be policy intervention to determine allocation and infrastructure development, at both national and international levels.
(I liked his Slide 7 from the powerpoint http://docs.google.com/Present?docid=d934wqg_529df7wm565 – a map of the world, color-coded for relative “water stress”)

Sankar Arumugam, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at North Carolina State University, continued the panel with a talk on climate forecasts and water management, and the need for a risk-management framework. Arumugam argued that one of the major reasons for failings in the climate prediction models is the misplaced and short-term goals of both the forecast producers and the forecast consumers. The producers are often removed climate scientists and hydrologists; and the consumers are water managers and reservoir operators, risk-averse and managing based on rule curves, who see no reward for using forecasts and might have difficulty interpreting or relating the forecasts. For seasonal forecasts to be useful, then, they must be prognostic, relate water supply risk to demand risk (assigning reliability for supply, as well as estimating reliability as part of the allocation process), and include compensations and penalties for correct/false forecasting. Well-calibrated forecasts improve confidence; integrating weekly weather forecasts with monthly and seasonal climate outlooks for systems designed to deliver peak power and maximum efficiency.

Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute and Professor of Sustainable Development at Columbia’s School of International Public Affairs

Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute and Professor of Sustainable Development at Columbia’s School of International Public Affairs, gave a talk on the integration, management and practical implementation of the complex issues surrounding water development strategies. Water, he argued, is the most difficult development issue facing the world right now: there is no easy substitute for water when it is not there, so the fight is at least a cold war if not a hot war. The potential for disaster seems quite high, and a lack of water can lead not only to water-related conflicts, but also to migration (as in Darfur). Populations are rising, and water-access is declining due to drops in precipitation, either from climate change or from climate variation. The Green Revolution had amazing but fragile effects, as the population continues to rise significantly (the median-to-high projection for 2050 is 1.6 to 1.9 billion people, up from the current 1.2 billion).

Sachs echoed Lall and others from earlier panels of the conference in calling for a multidisciplinary approach when looking at water issues in India which mobilizes a mix of skills to address the varied problems the country faces. Among those he mentioned were: hydrology (precipitation, climate, glaciology), agronomy (crop-modeling, breeding possibilities for drought-resistant or water-efficient seed varieties), demography (population dynamics, migration patterns), climatology (monsoon dynamics), infrastructure (on the community, river-shed, and region levels), and economy (water pricing, subsidies, and trade). Sachs called for an integrated, scientific and geography-based, ground-up modeling not often done by specialists who limit themselves to one field.

Solutions to this problem inherently require public, private and community-based approaches. Many political frameworks are needed for a proper solution. While the economist would love to just set a price, the physical world does not always behave according to economic models, and a price is not always going to provide infrastructure that needs to be provided on a community level. Also, when dealing with situations of poverty, pricing of necessary items such as water cannot always behave according to market-value, as a principle of social justice.

Panel Perspective on Agriculture, Water, and Impacts on Livelihoods

Kamal Vatta and Sebastian Morris, along with moderator Vijay Modi, formed the panel on the Perspective on Agriculture and Water and Impacts on Livelihoods. The panel focused on how to simplify subsidy structuring, how to most effectively incentivize sustainable and economically viable behavior, and the best way to achieve a better water- and energy-use trajectory.

Moderator Vijay Modi opened the discussion with a brief overview of the historical role of subsidies in Indian agriculture. The success of the Green Revolution in India was made possible through the use of subsidy programs which introduced plant-breeding science, scaled up supply chains of agrochemicals, mobilized a grass-roots agriculture extension effort, and ensured minimum support prices. The combination of these programs dramatically changed the agricultural climate of the country. Production of wheat in India, for example, doubled from 1966 to 1976, and doubled yet again in the 10 years following. On the flip side of this success-story, however, the same subsidies that revolutionized the country’s agriculture have also created a system which lacks incentive to exercise efficiency in water and energy use.

There are few alternatives to subsidies in farming, aside from simply doing nothing. In this case, many farmers would not be able to survive, and others would be forced to move to higher-value, low water-use crops when under groundwater stress, or even move to more resource-rich states. Another change option is to do more: create a subsidy program which augments the existing structure with additional subsidies that would, for example, promote the installation of water-efficient pumps and drip irrigation systems. Another alternative Modi proposed, which would be fleshed out during the rest of the conference, was the replacement of the energy subsidy for some sort of direct transfer which reflected an individual’s energy use.

Sebastian Morris gave a talk on subsidies with special reference to water and electricity. Morris argued that the current subsidy structure, in which farmers pay virtually nothing for either water or the electricity needed to pump water from groundwater wells, encourages waste, groundwater depletion, lack of investments in water saving, and regional disparity. Of the large amount of money spent on subsidies, very little actually reaches the poor. Morris proposed a cancellation of all subsidies, bundling them instead as direct transfers, reducing losses within the system and ensuring that the federal money actually reaches the individual poor farmers.

Kamal Vatta discussed several long-term options for changing the current subsidy structure in India to one that is more sustainable and economically productive. The first set of options included the introduction and promotion (through subsidies) of a variety of water-saving technologies: direct seeding of rice, laser-leveling of fields, use of tensiometer, and reduction of irrigation use from continuous flooding to periodic drainage. Another option posed a switch to more geographically appropriate crop choice—away from rice and wheat, and towards instead slightly riskier but more water-efficient options such as corn, basmati rice (which requires much less water than regular rice), and fruits and vegetables. This last option would need to be coupled with risk-mitigating mechanisms, investments in product and marketing infrastructure, insurance, and market intelligence. The final option he proposed was a gradual shift from free power to flat rates (at a marginal cost), and finally to metered pricing of energy.

Tobias Siefgried concluded the panel with a talk on reforming the electricity-groundwater conundrum. He started by going through the ways in which declining groundwater tables are problematic: energy-to-water inefficiency, loss of buffer during critical periods of drought, social equity (as marginal farmers lose out first in the race to the bottom), risk of groundwater pollution, and the dying off of shallow rooting of natural vegetation. Echoing several of the others from the panel, Siegried recognized that the current system of free energy incentivizes inefficient irrigation and agricultural production (such as inadequate crop choice). A solution, he said, would need to embed technical and economic solutions within a larger, institutional framework. The strategy would need to be transparent and intuitive, be easy to grasp for all stake-holders, and require minimum information requirements and transaction costs.

Friday, April 17th at the Asia Society

Strategies for Risk Management in Agricultural Production to Improve Water Productivity

Jerry Skees, Alok Sikka, Peter Rogers, Abed Khalil and moderator Daniel Osgood formed the panel on Strategies for Risk Management in Agricultural Production to Improve Water Productivity. The panel looked at the best ways to mitigate production and market risks while still incentivizing sustainable and energy-efficient behavior in the agricultural sector.

Daniel Osgood opened the discussion by looking at key choices available in risk management—whether the risk is related to climate variability, reliable water access, labor markets, market prices or other factors. He stressed the importance of protecting not just against the threat of drought, but also gathering mechanisms that are able to assess all risks and small individual choices.

Jerry Skees began by exposing the relationship between risky behavior and governmental subsidies. Subsidies, by design, pay people to take risks that result in behavior in some way necessary to society; it is, in this way, “disaster by design.” He posed the question of how to arrange subsidies in such a way that people take the right kinds of risks. Energy and water subsidies must also include insurance for the catastrophic situation, even when farmers are regulated in their water use. Since the government cannot afford to insure against every type of risk, however, Skees stressed that it was important to look for engineering and financial market solutions, as well as ways to help change the micro, household-level decisions which put collective stress on resources.

Alok Sikka, a Secretary in India’s Ministry of Agriculture, responded to Skees’ opening remarks about the relationship between risk-taking and subsidies, going over a few of the current steps that the Indian government is taking in this field. He noted that a recent increase in frequency and severity of various stresses has led farmers to become even less-risk averse than normal, and thus less likely to invest in new (energy- or water-efficient) technologies. While minimum support prices are one of the biggest safety nets for farmers, one-season crop insurance will not always suffice. Insurance, Sikka argued, must be coupled with improved knowledge at the hands of the policy-makers (such as climate forecasting for early warning signals, financial tools, and more user-friendly index support tools).

The rest of the panel was mostly an informal discussion between Peter Rogers, Daniel Osgood, Jerry Skees, and Upmanu Lall. Rogers brought up the point that governments and subsidies must not only cover risks (through insurance), but also provide mechanisms to reduce risk. Illustrating this very point, Skees mentioned the curious case of Vietnam—rice-growing is subsidized in many areas of the country, despite the historically determined probability that fields will flood 2 out of every 5 years.

Future Role of Public-Private Partnerships in the Context of Sustainability and Profitability of Agricultural Production/Resources

Abhiram Seth, Alok Sikka, Bruce Kahn and Tim Huh formed the panel on the Future Role of Public-Private Partnerships in the Context of Sustainability and Profitability of Agricultural Production/Resources. The panel looked at the best strategy to determine roses and needs of policy changes that would encourage appropriate private sector opportunity for investment.

Abhiram Seth opened the discussion on the role of public-private partnerships. One of the key players in the original introduction of contract farming in India, Seth looked at the reasons why the private sector’s participation is so vital to Indian agriculture. Apart from mango, India has no real success story in agro-exports, mostly because (as described in earlier panels of the conference) the main focus since Independence has been on famine-prevention and national food security, not maximization of income. Most of India’s agriculture comes from small land-owning farmers, and not large commercial corporations; these smaller farmers are often hesitant to make technology changes or investments, because the risk is a survival risk. Contract farming must have the ultimate goal of surplus value creation, and the system must be set up in such a way that this surplus value is split between the farmer and the private partner.

In a part of the panel that took on the format of an informal discussion between Alok Sikka, Upmanu Lall, Abhiram Seth, and Bruce Kahn, the role of the private sector in determining crop selection was discussed. Niche products (like spices and condiments) may bring in only a small profit, but can be organized geographically, on a macro scale, so as to create more export demand. Also, Lall posed the question as to whether there is a role for the university in creating a map of ideal crop selections, and whether such a map would be put to use by policy-makers. Seth cited the success of Green Revolution, but noted also that it was a huge bet, taken only because the crisis had arrived and put immediate pressure upon the government to do something. Can we move without that pressure?

Tim Huh concluded the panel with a talk about supply chain management, and the differences between a typical supply chain and an agricultural supply chain. Agriculture has an intrinsically public nature for two reasons: its input, water, is public; and its output, food, is also public. The sheer number of famers, as well, makes this problem public in nature. What are the best ways to make optimal decisions, and how do people make decisions in decentralized settings? Huh concluded by citing the example of Walmart as a company that was able to galvanize lots of people to create product that benefitted consumers (by being lower-priced) while still benefitting suppliers.

Pilot Subsidy Reform Program

Vijay Modi, presented a straw-man proposal for a pilot subsidy reform program that would aim to reduce water-use while remaining transparent and administratively simple. The main question to be answered was the following: In a small area (of 300 to 1000 farmers), can a program of subsidy reform be shown to be possible in which, compared to the current system, implementation leaks are less and ownership of ideas among farmer groups and the government is more? The proposal assumed an area where: water tables are spatially uniform across the sub-station; separate agriculture feeder exists; SOS level kWh consumption data exists for the last three years; and there is also data available on land ownership, who has how much agriculture, etc.

If in this sub-station the average based on all agricultural land for the last three years works out to 6000 kWh/ha per season, 60 (tradable) vouchers of 100 kWh each would be issued within the substation or feeder per hectare. Vouchers can be either used or “cashed” at end of season at market price, thus theoretically incentivizing conservation. If a farmer spends more than the allotted amount, they would then pay market price for water. The plan would involve cooperation with a local financial institution to capitalize the vouchers, and would also involve coordinated work with agriculture extension to intensively promote multiple options and techniques for water-saving.

In the group discussion after Modi’s presentation of this proposal, several problems and questions arose. Firstly, there was a question of how much energy per person is enough or too much. It was brought up that 6000 kWh per hectare is a huge number; while it could be argued to be justified in intensely overstressed areas, such as northern Gujarat, it should not become the national standard (which would probably be closer to 1000 kWh per hectare). Any number chosen for such a pilot program must be a number that is not too severe, but also not too large—because it must be accepted by the farmers, but also accomplish its goal of reduction of water-use. Comprehensive information of water-use per person is available in some areas of India, such as Gujarat. The number, clearly, would be reflective of the area chosen for the pilot study; should the area be an extreme situation (a situation which would probably be preferred by the state), or a more representative area?

Another question arose as to voucher distribution, its pragmatics and feasibility. It takes strong political will to impose a system of pricing on a once-free commodity: how will it be distributed, how will the distribution be paid for and organized, and how will any cashing or trading of vouchers be regulated? Distribution based on land owned assumes homogeneity of use, so people farming water-intensive crops would be hurt in the short-term. The goal, perhaps, is to encourage switching to more water-efficient crops and farming solutions; but what about the large farmer who is marginally disadvantaged, or the small farmer who only knows how to grow rice and is reluctant to change, or problems arising form disparity in money distributed via vouchers in different geographic locations within the same state? Also: is such a plan even feasible, economically? How much would it cost to do this with 1000 farmers, or even 300? It would be revenue-neutral for the state, but there would clearly be costs associated with consultants, as well as the associated labor and organization.

Saturday, April 18th at Columbia University

SIDHI Discussion

Lall continued to describe how a comprehensive model solution to the problem that India faces will need to be spatially explicit; consider groundwater and energy needs and storage; organize all data currently available; consider institutional factors of access, rights, pricing and their implications; and look at environmental and water quality impacts and concerns. The best way to do this will probably involve a multi-scale approach, ranging from the national, to the regional, to the prototypical village scales.

Following the talk, the discussion opened to all participants, and went over issues of location (Bihar, Punjab or Gujarat), time-scale, possible corporate partnerships, possible climate feedback, the importance of public image, and whether to prioritize water-efficiency, long-term sustainability, or global dominance in agriculture.

Participant Bios

Andrew Robertson

After graduating from the University of Leeds, U.K., with a B.Sc. in mathematics and geography, Robertson received an M.Sc. from Imperial College, London in atmospheric physics and dynamics, and a Ph.D. in atmospheric dynamics from the University of Reading in 1984 under the supervision of Brian Hoskins. He held postdoctoral and research positions at the Universities of Paris, Munich, and UCLA prior to joining the IRI (International Research Institute for Climate and Society) in 2001. Robertson currently leads the downscaling division within Columbia University’s IRI's Climate Program, and is the climate nodal person for IRI's Asia-Pacific regional program. He is also a Research Scientist with the Water Center. His work is focused on bringing climate information into regional projects that seek to demonstrate the value of "climate risk management," through targeted research, tool development, and training/outreach.

Sudhakar Kesavan

Sudhakar Kesavan serves as the Chairman and CEO of ICF International. Mr. Kesavan received his Master of Science degree from the Technology and Policy Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), his postgraduate diploma in Management from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, and his Bachelor of Technology degree (chemical engineering) from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. Mr. Kesavan serves on the Board of the Rainforest Alliance, a New York based nonprofit environmental organization committed to protecting ecosystems by transforming land-use practices, business practices, and consumer behavior. In 2007, Washington SmartCEO honored Mr. Kesavan as one of the Future 50, the magazine’s honor to chief executives of the Washington metropolitan area's fastest growing companies.

Praveen Kumar

Praveen Kumar is a professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Illinois, Urbana. He holds a Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from the University of Minnesota, an M.S. in Civil Engineering from Iowa State University, and a B.Tech. in Civil Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay. Dr Kumar is an expert in the use of computer models and informatics to increase our understanding of hydrologic processes. His research interests lie in developing a predictive understanding of the hydrologic cycle that integrates across ecosystems, climate, and human impacts. He received the NASA/Universities Space Research Association Award for Promise and Potential of a Young Scientist, the NASA New Young Investigator Award, and the College of Engineering Xerox Award for Faculty Research. He currently serves as the editor-in-chief for Water Resources Research, the major scientific journal in the field. Recently, he also served as editor for Geophysical Research Letters. From 2003 to 2008, he served on the Board of Directors for the Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc., an organization consisting of 120 members.

Rajagopalan Balaji

Balaji Rajagopalan holds a Ph.D from Utah State University and is Assistant Professor of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering at the University of Colorado. His work includes statistical climate modeling and its application to hydrology, water resources eng. related issues; Stochastic modeling of rainfall and other weather variables; scaling issues in rainfall; Spatial estimation of hydro-climate variables; nonparametric estimation of density and regression functions for Multivariate Time series analysis of climate data; Identifying inter-annual variability in hydro climate variables and nonlinear dynamical modeling and forecasting; and inferring long range climate variability through statistical analysis of paleo proxy datochastic Hydrology and Hydroclimatology.

Abhiram Seth

Abhiram Seth heads Aquagri Processing Pvt Ltd. He was formerly the Executive Director of Exports and External Affairs PepsiCo India. In that capacity he worked to form a unique Public-Private partnership built with the Punjab Government and Punjab Agricultural University for a contract farming model that is now acknowledged as a major private sector initiative in the field of agriculture. Abhiram started his career with Hindustan Lever Limited in 1975 where he worked for seven years in the Sales and Marketing function. Abhiram graduated in Economics from Delhi University, and then went on to do his Masters in Management Studies from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute, Bombay University with specialization in marketing. Abhiram has worked as the Chairman of the Water Committee of FICCI and Food Regulatory Committee of CII, as well as being actively associated in the Foreign Trade and Agriculture/Food Processing work of various apex bodies of Chambers of Commerce.

Kamal Vatta

Kamal Vatta is a professor at Punjab Agricultural University in the Department of Economics and Sociology in the college of Basic Sciences and Humanities Academics. He earned his Ph.D in Agricultural Economics from Punjab Agricultural University. He earned a diploma in Agricultural Research for Development at the International Centre for Development Oriented Research in Agriculture (ICRA) in the Netherlands. Kamal Vatta has dedicated more than nine years experience in teaching and research in Agricultural Economics. He specializes in Farm Management, Agricultural Policy, Climate Change and Food Security, Rural Development. He has been awarded the Dr. Sukhdev Singh Prize for Essay and Oration 2001-02 by Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, and the Award of Honour by the Society for Advancement of Academics, Sports and Cultural Activities. He is a member of the Indian Society of Agricultural Economics, Mumbai Indian Society of Agricultural Marketing, Nagpur Indian Society of Labour Economics, and the New Delhi Agricultural Economics Research Association.

Jeffrey Sachs

Jeffrey D. Sachs is the Director of The Earth Institute, Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development, and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University. He is also Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. From 2002 to 2006, he was Director of the UN Millennium Project and Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan on the Millennium Development Goals, the internationally agreed goals to reduce extreme poverty, disease, and hunger by the year 2015. Sachs is also President and Co-Founder of Millennium Promise Alliance, a nonprofit organization aimed at ending extreme global poverty. In 2004 and 2005 he was named among the 100 most influential leaders in the world by Time Magazine. He was awarded the Padma Bhushan, a high civilian honor bestowed by the Indian Government, in 2007. Sachs lectures constantly around the world and was the 2007 BBC Reith Lecturer. Sachs is a member of the Institute of Medicine and is a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research. Prior to joining Columbia, he spent over twenty years at Harvard University, most recently as Director of the Center for International Development. A native of Detroit, Michigan, Sachs received his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees at Harvard University.

Peter Rogers

Prof. Rogers is Gordon McKay Professor of Environmental Engineering and Professor of City Planning in the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University. He is a member of the Technical Advisory Committee of the Global Water Partnership, recipient of Guggenheim and Twentieth Century Fellowships. His research interests include the consequences of population on natural resources development, conflict resolution in international river basins, improved methods for managing natural resources and the environment, with emphasis on the use of analytic optimizing methods to incorporate both the natural phenomena and the engineering controls, the impacts of global change on water resources, and the development of indices of environmental quality and sustainable development, and Interaction of land use planning and central management. He has carried out extensive field and model studies on population, water and energy resources, and environmental problems in Costa Rica, Pakistan, India, China, the Philippines, Bangladesh and, to a lesser extent, in 25 other countries. His most recent work has focused on the relationship between Chinese electric power developments and their impact on global warming.

Upmanu Lall

Upmanu Lall is the Director of the Columbia Water Center. Dr. Upmanu Lall’s original training emphasized hydrology, water resource systems analysis, operations research and stochastic processes with applications to flood/drought risk and uncertainty assessment and the design and operation of water systems. His initial research led him to the conclusion that significant improvements in methods were needed to better represent the hydrologic processes considered in water management models. This assessment stimulated self-education in applied mathematics and statistics focused on (a) nonlinear dynamical systems, (b) nonparametric methods of function estimation and their application to spatio-temporal dynamical systems, and (c) the study of multi-scale climate variability and change as an integral component of hydrologic systems. As new knowledge was created in these areas, he has focused on its application to water resources management through innovation in adaptive or dynamic risk management methods that can use information on the structure of climate for simulation or forecasting. Recently, he has become concerned with the issue of global and regional water sustainability, and the more general issue of modeling and managing planetary change due to coupled human and natural dynamics.

Tobias Siegfried

Tobias Siegfried is a fellow at the Earth Institute and an adjunct assistant professor at the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University. He is an Associate Research Scientist with the Water Center. He investigates the problems of freshwater depletion and degradation in the context of demographic and economic development. His work is focused on regions where resources such as soil and water are scarce and where the implementation of efficient and sustainable management strategies is difficult due to inadequate economic, political, and institutional environments. Tobias Siegfried has an M.S. degree from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, an M.S. in International Relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and a Ph.D. at the Institute of Environmental Engineering at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in 2004. Tobias Siegfried has published his interdisciplinary scientific work in leading journals of the respective fields.(1998, 2001).

Vijay Modi

Vijay Modi is a professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Columbia University. (Ph.D. Cornell 1984, postdoctoral work MIT 1984–1986). He is also a Research Scientist with the Water Center. His expertise is in the field of energy sources and conversion, heat/mass transfer, and fluid mechanics. His current areas of research interest are related to energy infrastructure, CO2 sequestration (with Klaus Lackner in Earth and Environmental Engineering), fuel cells, distributed sensing/control of flow, and heat transfer.

David Ludden

David Ludden is Professor of Political Economy and Globalization in the Department of History at New York University. His research concentrates on South Asia and on histories of development in very long-term perspective. Additionally he has focused on economic development, agrarian conditions, health environments, empire, inequality, social conflict. He has edited four volumes of collected essays and written three monographs and over 50 articles and chapters. Professor Ludden has been awarded honors and fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fund (2003), American Council of Learned Societies (2002), and National Endowment for the Humanities (1990).

John Briscoe

John Briscoe is Professor of the Practice of Environmental Health, HSPH, and the Gordon McKay Professor of the Practice of Environmental Health, SEAS, at Harvard University. His career has focused on the issues of water and economic development. He has worked as an engineer in the water agencies of South Africa and Mozambique; as an epidemiologist at the Cholera Research Center in Bangladesh; as a professor of water resources at the University of North Carolina; and, for the past 20 years in a variety of policy and operational positions in the World Bank. Most recently he has served as the Bank's Senior Water Advisor and the Country Director for Brazil. He received his Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering at Harvard University in 1976 and his B.Sc. in Civil Engineering at the University of Cape Town, South Africa in 1969. Briscoe has served on the Water Science and Technology Board of the National Academy of Sciences and was a founding member of the major global water partnerships, including the World Water Council, the Global Water Partnership, and the World Commission on Dams. He currently serves on the Global Agenda Council of the World Economic Forum; is a member of the Council of Distinguished Water Professionals of the International Water Association; and will be the first Natural Resource Fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations. Recently he authored Water Sector Strategy, India's Water Economy: Bracing for a Turbulent Future, and Pakistan's Water Economy: Running Dry.

Casey Brown

Dr. Casey Brown is Leader of the Water sub-Program and Associate Research Scientist at the International Research Institute for Climate and Society of the Earth Institute at Columbia University. He is also a research scientist with the Water Center. Dr. Brown specializes in climate risk management for the water sector and sustainable management of water resources. His research focuses on increasing the resilience of water systems to climate variability and change through the use of advanced climate science and hydrologic forecasting, in combination with innovative water resources management techniques and economic mechanisms, including index insurance. He is PI and co-PI for several projects in the U.S. and abroad funded by NOAA, the World Bank and other agencies and is a 2007 recipient of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers. He is Associate Editor of the ASCE Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management and has published in Water Resources Research, Natural Resources Forum, International Journal of Climatology and the ASCE Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management, where a 2006 paper won the award for Best Policy-Oriented paper. Dr. Brown is Adjunct Assistant Professor in Columbia’s M.A. in Climate and Society program. Dr. Brown obtained his PhD in environmental engineering science as a National Science Foundation Fellow at Harvard University in 2004, is a licensed professional engineer in the state of Colorado and a former U.S. Air Force officer.

Dan Osgood

Dan seeks to bring advances in the use of seasonal climate information and financial mechanisms to improve livelihoods in developing countries. His Ph.D. in Agricultural and Resource Economics at the University of California at Berkeley addressed the use of weather information in irrigated agriculture. He has been involved in the contract design and evaluation process for index insurance pilots in countries including Malawi, Kenya, Tanzania, Nicaragua, and Honduras. Research contributions include work on the use of probabilistic information in decisionmaking, the valuation of environmental features, the use of remote sensing proxies in quantifying environmental amenities and environmental risk, the value of information in negotiation and markets, how uncertainty, risk, and information impacts negotiations between players, and work specific to index insurance climate information and economic development.

Jerry Skees

Jerry R. Skees is H. B. Price Professor of agricultural policy and risk at the University of Kentucky, and is also president of GlobalAgRisk, Inc. He received his Ph.D. from Michigan State University in 1981. His primary research program in recent years has been on developing new markets for sharing catastrophic risk. He has served as director of research with the Commission for the Improvement of the Federal Crop Insurance program and as visiting scholar with the Economic Research Service of USDA where he also was part of a task force that examined disaster assistance policy prior to the 1990 Farm Bill. Skees was the primary architect outside the Federal government in helping design and rate the USDA Group Risk Plan insurance. Skees has experience consulting for a major reinsurer, various insurance companies, farm organizations, the World Bank, and the U.S. government.

Bruce Kahn

Bruce Kahn, Director and Senior Investment Analyst at Deutsche Asset Management, advises portfolio managers and product developers on the thematic trends of climate change in both traditional and alternative investments. Bruce joined Deutsche Bank in 2008 with over 20 years of experience in environmental research and investments. He is a trustee of the Jesse Smith Noyes Foundation and holds a PhD in Environmental Science from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

Sebastian Morris

Sebastian Morris is a faculty member at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIMA) in economics. Additional areas of study include finance and behavioral sciences. He has been Fellow if the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta (economics). He passed the M.Sc of the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, with distinction. His research focuses on: Study of Determinants of Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) and strategies to attract FDI to Gujarat (on going). Government of Gujarat; strategy for restructuring of the electricity transmission, distribution and trading businesses in Haryana in context of the changes brought about by the Electricity Act 2003 (with Ajay Pandey, ongoing), Government of Haryana; Role of Small Scale Industries in the Age of Liberalisation (paper for the Policy Advisory Committee of the Asian Development Bank) (ongoing); and Pricing and Financing of Water, for Country Water Resources Sector Strategy, (World Bank, ongoing).

Sankar Arumugam

Sankar Arumugam is Professor of Water Resources/Environmental Engineering at North Carolina State University. His work focuses on understanding, modeling and forecasting hydrological fluxes at large spatial scales based on land surface and climatic indices; water resources planning and analysis; and integrated water management and environmental assessment in developing countries. Dr Arumugam received his PHD in Water Resources Engineering, Tufts University; his MS, Master of Science by Research, at the Indian Institute of Technology – Madras; and his BS in Agricultural Engineering at Tamilnadu Agricultural University in Coimbatore, India. He is a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers and the American Geophysical Union.

Woonghee Tim Huh

Professor Woonghee Tim Huh joined the Department of Industrial Engineering and Operations Research at Columbia University in 2003, after completing his doctoral research on strategic capacity planning in the semiconductor industry. His current research interests also include pricing and inventory control, supply chain management, and auction-theoretic models.

Kapil Narula

Kapil Kumar Narula is an Adjunct Associate Research Scientist at the Earth Institute of the Columbia University and Director, Columbia Water Centre India, based in New Delhi, India. Dr. Narula is a Ph.D in Integrated hydrological and hydro chemical modeling from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi, India. He graduated in Chemical Engineering with specialization in Environmental Engineering and was awarded the University prize for standing first in the University of Pune in Chemical Engineering in the year 1992. Dr. Narula is also a recipient of Junior and Senior Research fellowships of the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) and the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) where he researched on the topic of Area-differentiated supra-regional modeling of water resources and nitrate transport applicable to river basins (1997-1999, 2003). He carried out his research in Forschungszentrum Juelich (FZJ) (Research Centre Juelich), Germany. Dr. Narula has around 16 years of work experience in the fields of water resources modeling, estimating the impacts of climate and land use change on water resources, fate and transport of pollutants and nutrients in surface and groundwater, hydrologic analysis, water quality monitoring, and watershed planning. During these 16 years he has worked with The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), New Delhi, India, as the Associate Director, Water Resources Division; and CH2M HILL India as Senior Manager (Lead India) – Water Business Group. He has several publications both in national and international journals.

Alok Sikka

Alok Sikka is a Technical Expert of Watershed Development for the National Rainfed Area Authority (NRAA), part of the Government of India. He was formerly the director of the Indian Council for Agricultural Research Complex for the Easter Region, as well as the Basin Coordinator for Patna, Bihar. He has acted as Incharge for Central Soil & Water Conservation Research Training Institute, Fernhill, Udhagamandalam. Dr. Sikka brings over 25 years of experience in hydrology, watershed management and agriculture. He also led the CGIAR effort in India on Climate Change Impacts on Agriculture.

Abedalrazq Khalil

Abed Khalil is an AVP at PartnerRe. His specialties lie in weather underwriting and quantitative analysis. Abed has spent time working for the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and the Utah Water Research Laboratory at Utah State University, as well as in the department of Earth and Environmental Engineering at Columbia University.