Robin Abell

Robin Abell is TNC’s global director of durable freshwater protection. In that role, Robin leads a team working towards a vision of representative, connected, and biologically important freshwater ecosystems around the world to be durably protected, with measurable and meaningful impacts that both bend the curve of freshwater biodiversity loss and deliver value to local communities and beyond. Before rejoining The Nature Conservancy in 2022, Robin was the Freshwater Lead at Conservation International, where she was responsible for developing and implementing the organization’s freshwater strategy. Prior to that she was with The Nature Conservancy’s Global Water Program, where she led development of Beyond the Source, an analysis of co-benefits that would be produced from protecting the source waters of the world’s largest cities. Before that, she spent 16 years at World Wildlife Fund-United States, where she built a world-renowned freshwater science program.

Robin is an established leader in freshwater conservation science, focusing on what it takes to protect and conserve freshwater ecosystems and their biodiversity. Over the course of her career, she has provided strategic support to programs around the world, from the Amazon to the Mekong. She began her career by leading an assessment of the conservation status of North America’s freshwater ecoregions, which grew into the foundational Freshwater Ecoregions of the World, a biogeographic framework with associated data that remain in use. She collaborates with freshwater experts from all continents and is a frequent speaker at international events. Robin received a Master of Science from the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources and Environment, and a Bachelor of Arts from Yale University.