I have a broad interest in environmental economics to support sustainable development and natural resource management in developed and developing countries. My main research interests are in water resource economics, in particular water resource valuation, hydro-economic modelling and water policy instruments.
Before joining the department of Economics at the University of Waterloo, I was head of the department Environmental Economics at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (2009-2015). I worked 5 years outside academic research as chief economist in the Dutch Water Ministry (2000-2004) where I was responsible for the economic underpinning of (inter)national water policy in areas such as climate change and flood risks, water quality, urban water management and river restoration. Since 1 January 2016 I’m the Executive Director of the Water Institute at the University of Waterloo. I’m furthermore a visiting professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology in Zürich (www.eawag.ch), member of the External Advisory Board of the Vienna Technical University Doctoral Programme on Water Resource Systems (www. waterresources.at) and Editor-in-Chief of the Elsevier journal Water Resources and Economics (www.journals.elsevier.com/water-resources-and-economics).