Chrisje van Schoot ()

Chrisje studied Tropical Agriculture in Deventer, the Netherlands and obtained her M.Sc. degree in Agricultural Extension, with specializations in Communication, Media and Training from Reading University, UK.
She started her career in Zambia and Tanzania where she worked with women’s farming cooperatives and the agricultural extension service. Since 1984 Chrisje has been working in Yemen, Palestine, Pakistan, Somalia and Jordan, where she was engaged on long-, and short term assignments with projects in rural and urban water supply and sanitation, solid waste, community development, small scale livestock and social forestry, as well as in spate irrigation and research-extension-farmer linkages. She carried out field research for governmental and non-governmental organizations on workload of rural women, labour- and time saving devices and women’s empowerment. She also developed, organised and conducted many training courses. With all activities, she believes strongly in using participatory and mutual learning approaches.
Chrisje joined the GWA in April 2007 and because of her experience and affinity with the Middle East will devote herself especially to this region. She has a fair knowledge of the Arabic language. Chrisje is very happy with the opportunity to ally herself with all those working towards enhancing gender equity in all aspects of water resources management.