CERC Review Panel Biographies- Elizabeth Dowdeswell

Elizabeth Dowdeswell is a consultant and adjunct professor in public health at the McLaughlin-Rotman Centre for Global Health at the University of Toronto. Recently, she completed a term as founding president and CEO of Canada’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization. She has served as executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme, undersecretary general of the United Nations, and the assistant deputy minister of Environment Canada responsible for the National Weather and Atmospheric Agency. Earlier in her career, she served as deputy minister of culture and youth for the province of Saskatchewan, and as an educational consultant, a university lecturer and a secondary school teacher.

Dowdeswell chairs the Scientific Advisory Committee of the Council of Canadian Academies, and maintains directorships on the boards of several corporations, as well as advisory positions to a number of not-for-profit organizations. She was also one of the first mentors for the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation.

Dowdeswell is the recipient of nine honorary degrees, including six Doctor of Law degrees from various universities, a Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Mount Saint Vincent University in Halifax, and the Memorial Gold Medal awarded by Charles University in Prague.