Roberto Lenton is Chair of the Technical Committee of the Global Water Partnership (GWP), which is hosted by the Earth Institute at Columbia University, and concurrently Chair of the Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC) and Senior Advisor for International Development at the International Research Institute for Climate and Society (IRI).

As Chair of the Technical Committee of the GWP, Dr. Lenton is leading the Committees work to create, accumulate and disseminate knowledge on ways to manage water resources in more integrated ways. As Chair of WSSCC, he is leading the Steering Committee in its work to develop the Councils policies and strategy, and guiding the Councils efforts to help countries achieve the Millennium Development Goals for water and sanitation. And at the IRI, Dr. Lenton is advising the Director-General and Board on matters relating to international programs and partnerships, promoting and spearheading fundable initiatives that link IRIs scientific efforts to sustainable development processes.

Dr. Lenton served from 2002-2005 as Co-chair of the UN Millennium Project Task Force on Water and Sanitation, one of ten task forces created to advise the UN Secretary General on the best strategies to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Previously Dr. Lenton was Executive Director of the IRI Secretariat for International Affairs and Development, which was the initial vehicle charged with the task of moving the IRI forward as a truly international institution. Prior to joining the IRI, he was Director of the Sustainable Energy and Environment Division (SEED) at the United Nations Development Programme in New York, from 1995 to end-2000; Director General of the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), a Sri Lanka-based member center of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), from 1987 to 1994; and Program Officer with the Ford Foundation in New Delhi and New York, from 1977 to 1986.

Dr. Lenton, who is a citizen of Argentina, received a Civil Engineering degree from the University of Buenos Aires and Masters and Ph.D. degrees in Water Resources Systems from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). A member of MIT's Civil Engineering Faculty from 1974 to 1977, Dr. Lenton is a lead author of Health, Dignity and Development: What Will it Take?, and co-author of Applied Water Resources Systems, as well as the author or co-author of numerous papers and book chapters on scientific, technical and policy subjects.