Rebekah Hinton
Research Scholar
Water Security Research Group
Biodiversity and Natural Resources Program
Biography
Rebekah Hinton joined the Water Security Research Group of the IIASA Biodiversity and Natural Resources Program as a research scholar in September 2025. Her research focuses on the intersection of environment and society, with a particular emphasis on groundwater. She has experience addressing multiple dimensions of water scarcity, including challenges related to water quantity, quality, and access. She is particularly interested in leveraging modeling approaches to support understanding in data-scarce contexts and is passionate about interdisciplinary, impact-oriented research to illuminate complex issues and inform policy.Hinton is currently working on groundwater for resilience development in Africa. She is developing the Community Water Model (CWatM), integrating stakeholder expertise for the Upper Nile Basin in Uganda, while also exploring continental-level opportunities and threats to groundwater. Additionally, she applies her interdisciplinary experience to water challenges in Europe, examining water security risks from hydroclimatic extremes.
She has research experience across Europe, Asia, and Africa. Prior to joining IIASA, she was a postdoctoral researcher at Wageningen University in the Netherlands within the Public Administration and Policy group, contributing to projects on groundwater governance under extreme conditions and innovation in water service provision.
She earned her PhD from the University of Strathclyde and the James Hutton Institute (2024) in the UK, during which she participated in the 2023 IIASA Young Scientists Summer Program (YSSP). Her PhD research involved collaborating with the Government of Malawi to assess challenges and opportunities for achieving Sustainable Development Goal 6 (Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all) and developing groundwater models addressing quantity, quality, and sanitation-related pollution. Hinton also holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Cambridge (2020).
Last update: 18 SEP 2025
Publications
Geagea, D., Pharr, K., Valin, N., Hinton, R. , Bijlsma, I., de la Rosa, S., & Koehler, J. (2026). Engendering the policy debate on valuing water. Environmental Science & Policy 179 e104378. 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104378.