Ms. Harriet Bigas is the Project Associate for the Drylands Programme at UNU-INWEH. Since joining UNU-INWEH in 2006, Ms. Bigas has been involved in the management of a global GEF project focusing on the development of a broad knowledge management system for tracking impacts across projects which combat land degradation through sustainable land management.

Ms. Bigas contributes to the implementation of drylands projects focusing on land degradation and desertification, alternative livelihoods, natural resources management, capacity development, and knowledge management systems. She is involved in the organisation of the Joint MSc Programme on Integrated Drylands Management. Ms. Bigas has played a key role in the organization of three major international conferences which aim to impact the science-policy dialogue, including the Joint International Conference on Desertification and the International Policy Imperative (2006) and the First UNCCD Scientific Conference on Understanding Desertification and Land Degradation Trends (2009), and has produced several publications on various drylands topics.

Ms. Bigas was born in Canada and completed both her undergraduate (B.A. Hon.) and graduate (M.A.) degrees at McMaster University.