Anais Zimmer

As an agronomist from the Ecole Nationale Superieure Agronomique of Toulouse (INPT-ENSAT), with a strong interest in mountain regions, Anaïs Zimmer has a breadth of experience working on issues related to natural resource management, agronomy and climate change. She did her master thesis within the French Research Institute for Development (IRD) in La Paz Bolivia, through the BIOTHAW project. Her research was about primary succession after glacier retreat in the High Tropical Andes. Over the past four years, she has been working for a US-based NGO, The Mountain Institute (TMI), in the Cordillera Blanca Mountain Range of the Peruvian Andes. Serving as full-time coordinator of the community component of the climate change adaptation program “Securing Mountain Water and Livelihoods” was both a highly challenging and enjoyable experience from which she became aware of how much work is yet to be done for the environment and local communities in highland areas.

Now, she is pursuing doctoral studies at the Department of Geography and the Environment of the University of Texas at Austin. She wish to further explore ecological changes from the upward migration of alpine communities, wetland ecosystem processes, soils and grassland formation as well as their influence on ecosystem services for human populations. The main aim of her research is to increase the understanding of how periglacial ecosystems could contribute to indispensable hydrological services, supplying water for local and Regional (subnational) populations. She works in multiples sites in the Andes (Peru, Bolivia, Colombia) and in the Alps (France, Ecrins and Mont Blanc Massif), setting up a biogeographical comparison between continents.