Treading the complexities of living with(out) waters: Stories from the Philippine and Peruvian Amazon

What does living with(out) water look like? Mendoza’s lecture departs from stories that narrate ironies and realities of rural communities who are expected to provide food commodities, yet are further marginalized by silencing their ways of living. The presentation will highlight specific cases that range from struggles of farmers in the Philippines who are highly affected by changing climate, while also expected to change their ways of producing; and from struggles of communities who constantly live with(out) waters in the Peruvian Amazon, and whose aspirations and capacities to live by the rivers are dismissed.

You can register for this session here.

Assigned readings:

Academic references

• State and risk production: a case study from river communities in Belen-Iquitos (Gorenstein, 2019) (article in Spanish, abstract translated to English)
• Lessons Learned from River Communities in Peru (Gorenstein, 2021)
• Inclusive Landscape Governance for Sustainable Development: Assessment Methodology and Lessons for Civil Society Organizations (Kusters et al., 2020)

Practice-oriented references

• Outcomes of participatory multi-stakeholder dialogues in the Philippines (Tropenbos, 2021)
• Landscape reports (Sierra Madre, Palawan, Bukidnon-Misamis Oriental)

0.5 ECTS credits after participation to more than 80% of the sessions and engagement with assigned readings

This webinar is the opening session of the Water Security & Justice webinar series that takes place between 21 February and 1 May. Please visit this page to see more information about the series and the full program.

About the speaker

Heidi Mendoza is a PhD Candidate from the Water and Climate Risk group at the Institute for Environmental Studies (IVM). Her PhD research focuses on the past and future qualitative storylines of drought-to-flood events as part of the PerfectSTORM Project (‘STOrylines of futuRe extreMes’). Before joining VU Amsterdam, she was the Program Coordinator of the Sustainable and Inclusive Landscape Governance (SILG) implemented by Foundation Philippines, Tropenbos International, and Wageningen University and Research. Her work entailed designing and facilitating inclusive, and creative dialogues to bring stakeholders together towards sustainable management, and governance of Sierra Madre, Palawan, and Bukidnon-Misamis Oriental landscapes in the Philippines. She also led collaborative research work on community forest rights, and landscape governance assessments.