Maria del Pilar Cornejo de Grunauer

She is a physical oceanographer by training. Currently, she is a professor at ESPOL Polytechnic University and the Director of the Pacific International Center for Disaster Risk Reduction. She has been teaching undergraduate Oceanography and Aquaculture for over 34 years, as well as Aquaculture and Climate Change at the postgraduate level. She has worked on the impacts of climate variability on socioeconomic sectors in the humid tropics of the Americas, in addition to focusing on integrated water management, environmental sustainability, and disaster risk reduction. She has also served on several international committees and coordinated regional programs.
For a period of six years, she became a policymaker as the first Secretary of State for Risk Management in Ecuador, utilizing science to implement disaster risk reduction (DRR) actions and building up the Ecuadorian DRR system. She also belongs to the AmeriGEO family. Currently, her work focuses on Disaster Risk Reduction, Climate Resilience, Sustainable Cities, and Nature-Based Solutions for DRR and Climate Change Adaptation, with an emphasis on delivering public policy options to advance the 2030 Agenda.

Having navigated two different worlds—Academia and Decision-Making—has given her a unique perspective on the actions needed to build a resilient Earth and how to work within a transdisciplinary framework.