Our Team
Hannah Wuzel
cewas Project Manager
Hannah holds a MSc Global Politics and a BA International Studies. Early on in her career, she co-initiated and supported various socially oriented ventures, in particular those focusing on capacity building for migrant entrepreneurs. For the past years, she has been leading cewas’ activities in Lebanon, contributing to the design and successful execution of two one-year long business training programs and coaching 30 environmental entrepreneurs from early stage to scale-up. In the MENA region, she supports environmental ecosystem actors and has facilitated the growth of over 90 innovators through tailored TA.
Michael Kropac
cewas Co-Director
Michael is founder and Co-director of cewas – the world’s first dedicated water and sanitation entrepreneurship platform. Throughout his 18 years of work experience, Michael has been an innovator, knowledge producer, trainer, facilitator and specialized water/food business development coach. Michael is a Geographer with minors in Business Administration and Transdisciplinary Environmental Sciences. He has planned and conducted 100+ capacity development programs for practitioners, decision makers and innovators, including 200+ WEF entrepreneurs worldwide.
May Haghour
cewas Programme Officer
May is an urban planner and holds a master’s degree in International Development and Cooperation from from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich. Her passion lies with fostering sustainable innovation, social entrepreneurship, and knowledge transfer in various contexts. May has worked for various NGOs and academic institutions in Europe and the MENA region such as Caritas Switzerland and the Technical University of Cottbus (BTU) with strong focus on Project Cycle Management, communication, and business development. May is currently working as Programme Officer at cewas in developing and monitoring the communication and knowledge management strategy for the multilateral global Program Water and Energy for Food Program in the MENA Region as well as developing Youth Water and Climate Career Curriculum for Ersamus+ Program.
Owice Hammad
cewas Project Manager
Owice supports on-ground activities in Jordan in addition to the one-on-one coaching and mentoring he provides to cewas’s start-ups. He also gives training in team development and formation. What he offers stem from the collective experience of practicing engineering, research, writing, human-human connections, and master studies. Owice is the founder of Turjumaa: a company that provides water and sanitation translation services, which is his side job. Owice holds a bachelor degree in Civil Engineering and a master’s degree in Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM).
Frederic de Dinechin
CMI Senior Knowledge Management Officer
Frederic de Dinechin joined the Center for Mediterranean Integration in 2019 as Senior Knowledge Management Officer. He works on CMI resilience pillar: mitigation and adaptation to external stresses and shocks mainly climate change. He leads the Regional knowledge program on water and the Territorial resilience to climate change program. Prior to this assignment, Frederic worked in multilateral development banks including the World Bank and the Council of Europe Development Bank and had experiences in the private and public sectors in France. He has a broad international experience including long term assignments in North and Latin America. He graduated from the Ecole Polytechnique in France and holds masters’ degrees in Geographic Information Systems, and Urban Planning.
Ines Gasmi
CMI Consultant
Ines is a an early career researcher currently finalizing her PhD in Agricultural Sciences with specialization in Desertification, Environment and Climate change in the Institut National Agronomique de la Tunisie and the Institut des Régions Arides-Tunisie. She holds a Master’s degree in Combating Desertification and Sustainable Management of Natural Resources in Dry Areas (2013) from the Institut National Agronomique de Tunisie, and a master’s degree in Land Management in Dry Lands (2017) from UNU-INWEH. Since she comes from a country that suffers from water shortage and direct impact of climate change, Ines was always trying to find solutions to protect water resources. Therefore, she joined the CMI water team in October 2019 and is the MedYWat membership Focal Point.
Asma Bachikh
CMI Consultant
Asma is a young water professional from Morocco. She has previously served as president of the World Youth Parliament for Water for a mandate of three years between 2015-2018. She has worked on developing youth strategies for multiple leading water organizations and led the implementation of several water youth initiatives in different parts of the world. Asma is also one of the co-founders and co-president of the Climat’Optimistes. She has a Master’s of Law in China studies with a focus on international relations and politics from Peking University and a Master’s of Science in water science policy and management from the University of Oxford.
Cyril Frederick Gourrard
CMI Consultant
Cyril works as a consultant within the CMI’s Water Program. He coordinates the CMI Water Expert Hub and provides project management support on a 2-years project looking into the Water Security Nexus in North Africa. Prior to joining CMI, Cyril worked at Earthquakes and Megacities Initiative (EMI) as a project manager and Urban Disaster Risk Management specialist in Asia as well as in MENA. He holds two Master’s degrees, one in computer engineering from the INSA and another in Urban Planning from the IUAR of the Aix-Marseille Université.