Professor Rob Hope

Professor of Water Policy

Director, Water Security Initiative, School of Geography and the Environment

Director of the Water Programme, Smith School for Enterprise and the Environment

Member of the Oxford Water Network

Member of the Environment Research Doctoral Training Partnership

Academic Profile

Professor Rob Hope is Director of the Water Security Initiative at the School of Geography and the Environment and Director of the Water Programme at the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment. His research interests focus on water policy, poverty and economics, largely in Africa and Asia.

How research can deliver social and environmental impacts has shaped his work and long-term partnerships with governments, social enterprises, private sector and academia. For example, between 2015 and 2024, he directed the £22m FCDO-funded REACH (www.reachwater.uk) which improved water security for 10 million vulnerable people in Africa and Asia. As part of the Exit Strategy, this work is being scaled up and scaled out in existing and new geographies to target 100 million vulnerable people by 2030.

One example includes collaboration with Uptime Global, which designs and executes results-based contracts for over 5 million rural people in 16 countries in 2024. Oxford research has informed the institutional and financial architecture for results-based contracts, which is guiding wider sector change and investments in collaboration with development banks, bilateral donors and governments. Foundational research grants for this work have been awarded through multiple competitive grants by ESRC, NERC, FCDO, the EU, and USAID. 

The impact of the research has been recognised in the University of Oxford’s Vice Chancellor’s Awards in 2024 (Research Engagement winner, REACH) and 2018 (Overall winner and Capacity Building category winner, Smart Handpumps). To support the impact of this work, Rob has acted as pro bono Trustee for the Kenyan Water Services Maintenance Trust Fund (2016-2025) and the Uptime Catalyst Facility (2020-present). 

Rob has served as both the Academic Director and the Course Director for the MSc Water Science, Policy and Management (WSPM). He teaches and supervises students on WSPM and the MSc on Sustainability, Enterprise and the Environment. 

Current Research

Teaching and Supervision

Graduate Research Students

Medha Mukherjee
(OICSD/Somerville)
Intersectional Inequalities and Drinking Water Choices in India2022-present
Kristina Nilsson
(Bank of America/ Uptime Global)
Public finance and drinking water services in rural Africa and Asia2022-present
Sandra Serumaga-ZakeWater Infrastructure Finance in sub-Saharan Africa
(co-supervisor Dr Alex Money)
2021- present
Johannes Wagner
(EU NEWAVE)
Rural Water Finance in Africa
(co-supervisor Dr Johanna Koehler)
2020-2025
(completed)
Andrew ArmstrongRevenue patterns of piped water services in rural Africa
(co-supervisor Dr Johanna Koehler)
2019-2022
(completed)
Rebecca Peters
(Marshall & REACH)
Normalized non-compliance - regulation of river pollution in Dhaka, Bangladesh2017-2022
(completed)
Ranu Sinha
(OICSD, Somerville)
Irrigation infrastructure, institutions and poverty in India
(co-supervisor - Prof Simon Dadson)
2015-2020
(completed)
Heloise Greeff
(UNICEF)
Condition monitoring methods to predict handpump failure in rural Africa
(lead supervisor - Prof David Clifton)
2015-2020
(completed)
Alex Fischer
(REACH)
Building water secure institutions in rural Bangladesh2015-2019
(completed)
Jacob Katuva
(BASE/Oxford)
Water and Welfare in Coastal Kenya2014-2020
(completed)
Johanna Koehler
(Clarendon)
Water Risks and Institutional Change in Kenya2014-2018
(completed)
Tim Foster
(ESRC)
From cash flows to water flows - new models for rural water sustainability in Africa2012-2016
(completed)
Alex MoneyCorporate water risk and return
(co-supervisor, Prof Gordon Clark)
2010-2014
(completed)
Aaron Krolikowski
(Clarendon)
Wireless Water - impacts and implications of mobile water payment innovations in Dar Es Salaam2011-14
(completed)
Alvar ClosasBurning water: institutions, technology, statecraft and the production of water scarcity Spain2009-13
(completed)
Alexandra Girard
(Hay)
Women, Water and Work in Rural India2009-14
(completed)
Caroline King
(NERC)
Oasis ecosystems, global change and human development in north Africa
(co-supervisor, Prof D. Thomas, SoGE)
2008-12
(completed)

Selected Publications

BOOK
The Water Diaries: Living with the Global Water Crisis in Bangladesh and Kenya
Authors
Sonia Hoque and Rob Hope
Cambridge University Press
ISBN:
9781009299596
The Water Diaries. CUP. CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0
BOOK
Water Science, Policy, and Management: A Global Challenge
Authors
Dadson, S.J., Garrick, D.E., Penning-Rowsell, E.C., Hall, J.W., Hope, R. and Hughes, J. (eds.) (2019)
John Wiley and Sons Ltd
ISBN:
9781119520603
Water Science, Policy, and Management: A Global Challenge
Grafton, R. et al. (2024) Nature Sustainability [Preprint].
2071423 - Rethinking responses to the world?s water crises
Wagner, J. et al. (2024) World Development, 185.
2032385 - Can solar water kiosks generate sustainable revenu...
Hope, R. (2024) Science (New York, N.Y.), 385(6710), pp. 708–709.
2023316 - Four billion people lack safe water.
Wagner, J. et al. (2024) npj Clean Water, 7(1).
2012770 - Is volumetric pricing for drinking water an effect...
Hope, R. et al. (2024) Nature Water, 2(6), pp. 502–504.
2007656 - Science?practitioner partnerships for sustainable ...
Charles, K. et al. (2024). University of Oxford.
2024952 - Creating an enabling environment for research impa...
Akhter, T. et al. (2023) Water, 15(13).
1490902 - Hydrogeologic constraints for drinking water secur...
Chintalapati, P. et al. (2022) Environmental Science and Technology, 56(23), pp. 17364–17374.
1309726 - Improving the reliability of water service deliver...
Armstrong, A. et al. (2022) Global Environmental Change, 76.
1259058 - Intra-seasonal rainfall and piped water revenue va...
Armstrong, A., Hope, R. and Koehler, J. (2022) Environmental Research: Infrastructure and Sustainability, 2(3), pp. 035003–035003.
1232266 - Piped water revenue and investment strategies in r...