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Mia MacDonald - Senior Fellow


Gender, Population, Conservation/Biodiversity, International Development, Rights and Livelihoods, Animal Welfare

Mia MacDonald is a Worldwatch senior fellow whose research focuses on gender and population, biodiversity conservation, and reproductive health and rights. Based in New York, Mia works as a policy analyst and writer. Since 1997, she has worked as a consultant for United Nations agencies, foundations, and international non-profit organizations, including the UN Population Fund, UNICEF, the Ford Foundation, the World Wildlife Fund, the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, and the Ms. Foundation for Women, among others. Currently, Mia is also serving as adjunct lecturer and co-director of the human rights concentration at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.

Between 1994 and 1997, Mia was on the staff of the International Women’s Health Coalition in New York, where she developed and managed a public policy and public affairs program. She also participated in the UN’s International Conference on Population and Development in 1994 and the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995, as well as in the respective preparatory meetings.

Mia has a Master’s degree in public policy with a concentration in international development from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. She received her Bachelor’s degree in English from Columbia University and also spent a year studying English and Politics at Oxford University.

  • “Linking Population, Women and Biodiversity” (with Danielle Nierenberg), in: State of the World 2003. New York: W.W. Norton, 2003.
  • Disappearing Landscapes: The Population/Environment Connection, Washington, DC: Center for Conservation Innovation, World Wildlife Fund, 2001.
  • “Globalization and Its Discontents” and “The Dilemma of Development,” in: The Way of Compassion: Survival Strategies for a World in Crisis, Stealth Technologies, 1999.

Mia has spoken at Columbia and Tufts universities as well as at a variety of NGO and activist gatherings.

Mia has appeared on CNN International’s “Your World Today,” Washington Post’s Live Online, public radio stations in the U.S. and Canada, and Wisdom Radio. Her writing or comment has appeared in The International Herald Tribune, TomPaine.com, E magazine, Environmental News Network, Environment News Service, Guerrilla News Network, Satya magazine, the Animals’ Agenda magazine, and MPA (Marine Protected Areas) News.