Staff | Sissel Waage
Director, Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services | San Francisco
Sissel Waage, PhD, is BSR’s Director of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. She has over twenty years of experience working on sustainability and environmental issues in North America, Europe, and Africa.
Previously, she worked for Forest Trends in various leadership positions, including as Director of the International Katoomba Group. Prior to this work, Sissel launched and led the R&D Program at the Natural Step, an international advisory services and research organization focused on sustainable business. She also served as core staff with the Natural Step’s Services Group, advising Fortune 100 companies on integration of sustainability into strategy, operations, reporting, and philanthropy. Earlier in her career, Sissel worked with Sustainable Northwest and the World Wildlife Fund's East and Southern Africa Program. She has also consulted with a range of nonprofits, foundations, and businesses, including: the Blodgett Forest Research Station at the University of California, Berkeley, "The Head Table" (a reality television program), the Garfield Foundation, the Packard Foundation, and the Biodiversity Support Program.
Sissel has taught in the Executive Certificate program at the Presidio Graduate School and currently teaches a course on ecosystem services at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her work has been published in journals including the Journal of Sustainable Forestry, Corporate Environmental Strategy, Environmental Finance, Society & Natural Resources, Political Geography, and the Journal of Cleaner Production. She has edited two books entitled, Ants, Galileo, and Gandhi: Designing the Future of Business through Nature, Genius, and Compassion (Greenleaf Publications, 2003) and Ignition: What You Can Do to Fight Global Warming and Spark a Movement (Island Press, 2007).
Sissel completed her Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley, in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management. She also holds an M.S. in Forestry, also at U.C. Berkeley, and her B.A. magna cum laude from Amherst College. She studied at the University of Oslo as a Fulbright Scholar and at the National University of Singapore.
Expertise
Biodiversity, ecosystem services, climate change, water issues.
