Ekow Edzie

Ekow is a Foreign Service Officer, currently serving at the U.S. Embassy in Conakry, Guinea. Previously, he was a senior associate at the Consensus Building Institute (CBI), where he facilitated multi-party negotiations on natural resource governance issues. His areas of focus included groundwater sustainability, landscape-level forestry collaboratives, and facilitating improved engagement of disadvantaged communities within environmental policy decisions. Prior to working with CBI, Ekow worked with the international education company EF Education First. He helped the firm launch an operation in the Dominican Republic and develop partnerships with environmental and humanitarian organizations in the DR, Peru and Ecuador. He also served with the U.S. Peace Corps in the Dominican Republic, where he was embedded within the DR’s National Environmental School, created curricula, taught courses in ecology and ecotourism and facilitated the development of a community-based ecotourism project based out of a protected area. Ekow holds a master’s degree in law and diplomacy (MALD) from The Fletcher School of Tufts University, where he concentrated in development economics, negotiation and land governance. At Fletcher, his master’s thesis explored the Colombian land restitution process and opportunities for coordinated rural development strategy to benefit restitution claimants while supporting Colombia’s climate change adaptation efforts and goals for economic growth. Ekow also holds a BA from Middlebury College in environmental studies with a minor in biology.