Bio

Silvia Hostettler studied Tropical Environmental Science at the University of Aberdeen (UK) followed by a postgraduate course on development studies with EPFL which took her to Burkina Faso for six months. Upon returning from Africa, she started working with IUCN จC The World Conservation Union at IUCN headquarters in Gland as Coordinator of the Cloud Forest Initiative. In 2001, she was recruited as Research Program Coordinator at EPFL in the framework of the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research North-South. At the same time, she fulfilled a mandate for backstopping regional workshops in Ethiopia, Kenya, Cuba, Bolivia, Nepal and Vietnam. In 2007, she obtained her PhD on land use change and international migration in western Mexico. From 2008 to 2012 she was based in Bangalore, India as Executive Director of swissnex, a Swiss House for Science facilitating research collaboration between Switzerland and India. During her posting in India, she set up the swissnex office, hired the team and organized over 50 events. Since September 2012, she is Deputy Director of the Cooperation and Development Center (CODEV) at EPFL in Switzerland where she is responsible for coordinating research activities and for directing the Biennial International Conference of the UNESCO Chair in Technologies for Development. She is also in charge of the education programs offered by CODEV at Master and Bachelor level, planning the launch of a Minor in Development Engineering at EPFL as of 2016. In collaboration with her team, she is developing a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) in technologies for disaster risk reduction and gives lectures in the field of cooperation and development. Her research interests focus on human-nature interactions, technologies for development, innovation in the Global South, land use change, international migration, community-based natural resource management, tropical forest ecology and sustainable development. She is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Development Engineering and of the Commission for Research Partnerships with Developing Countries (KFPE). She is passionate about sustainable development and enjoys yoga and hiking in remote corners of wilderness.