Meet our people – Juanita Moolman
Our hydrologists are exceptional people with diverse skillsets and experience from Australia and around the world. At eWater Group we are lucky to have a team of hydrologists providing their expertise and knowledge.
We can’t tell the story of eWater Group without our people; they are what makes our organisation what it is.
Our team are the backbone, and we want to celebrate and recognise them by putting a spotlight on one of our most respected and senior hydrologists, Juanita Moolman, who has been at eWater Limited since 2012.
Tell us about yourself?
How our world works and the people who live on it has always spurred a deep curiosity for Juanita who has had a long-distinguished 35-year career in both South Africa and Australia. Her love for the natural world was reinforced while at university where she spent her summer holidays collecting field data to be input in the modelling system being developed in the local Hydrology Department and grew from there, culminating her obtaining Honours in Hydrology.
Her career in South Africa saw her working with new hydrological technology and research, at the time, and to be applied it to local dams, irrigation, and catchment areas across South Africa, before taking this experience and moving to Australia 13 years ago for new opportunities, including the Bureau of Metrology, before joining eWater Group.
What is your role at eWater Group?
As an integrated water resource scientist at eWater Group, she contributes skills in catchment hydrology, spatial analysis, and automated big data analysis.
“As a hydrologist at eWater, I am in the business of contributing to the creation and use of the tools to effectively manage our increasingly threatened water resources, which can help meet the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (6) ensuring availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all.”
What project are you most proud of?
Juanita has worked on many projects during her 13 years at eWater that she has felt honoured to be a part of, including her role in the first-ever integrated assessment of the Ayeyarwady River Basin in Myanmar in 2017. The Basin, which starts in the Himalayas and runs through Central Myanmar, is a major water resource for the communities that live alongside it.
The project, supported by the World Bank and Australian Water Partnership, saw eWater Group develop a Source water system model for the Basin to understand water availability and uses, as well as implications for climate change.
“It felt honored to be part of a group of people brought together from various global organisations to document the understanding of the Basin for the first time. And providing something which can be used as a baseline for future work.”
What does it mean to work at eWater Group?
She has a strong interest in building the capacity of future generations to meet the challenges that will be facing global water availability. “As part of my role I have had the opportunity to train and mentor hydrologists from across the region as well as our own team and sharing my knowledge and experience with them is very rewarding for me.”
For Juanita, working at eWater Group provides the opportunity to be at the forefront of the conversation when it comes to water management and modelling in this country. “As the custodian of Source, the national hydrological modelling platform, we have the tool that is designed to manage Australia’s water resources. It is a key tool to understanding our changing environment, water quality and management, and how we respond to it.”
Water – either its presence or lack of – remains an important issue in Australia and internationally. For eWater, our hydrologists, together with our software developers and our broader teams, can provide our governments and partners the expertise, knowledge, and tools to make informed and sustainable decisions for our future.
Want to find out more?
For more information about eWater Group Source and its other world-class tools – Tools – eWater
To learn more about the Ayeyarwady River Basin project – Understanding the water resources of the Ayeyarwady Basin, Myanmar – eWater
To find out more on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals visit – THE 17 GOALS | Sustainable Development (un.org)