John H. Matthews is the Secretariat Coordinator and co-founder of the Alliance for Global Water Adaptation, which is hosted by the World Bank and the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI). His work blends technical and policy knowledge for climate adaptation and water management for practical implementation. John has worked on five continents and more than 20 countries. He has written primarily on decision making frameworks for adapting water infrastructure and ecosystems to climate impacts. He co-founded the ClimateIsWater advocacy group, led by the World Water Council.
Recent projects have included leading teams to develop green and climate bond resilience criteria for water investments, co-authoring guidance and leading a global community of practice focused on mainstreaming climate adaptation into public water management institutions, developing climate-sensitive approaches to environmental allocations such as eflows, working with global policy instruments and institutions to embed water climate knowledge into climate mitigation and adaptation initiatives, coordinating efforts to use finance mechanisms to implement nature based solutions to climate adaptation, assembling curricula to build capacity around sustainable resource management, and exploring new economic tools to support integrated long-term planning.
John is also a columnist with OoskaNews, a Senior Water Fellow at Colorado State University, and a Courtesy Faculty member of the Water Resources Graduate Program at Oregon State University. Previously, John started and directed global freshwater climate adaptation programs for WWF and Conservation International. He has PhD in ecology from the University of Texas, where he studied long-distance migration of dragonflies.