Q&A with Xia Vivian Zhou, Agricultural & Resource Economics Analyst

Tell us what you do at The Freshwater Trust.
My work focuses on water conservation management for agricultural and forest lands, including economic analyses, agricultural production research, and the development of optimization solver tools, which help us determine the optimal conservation acreage for the lowest implementation cost and estimate benefit-cost ratios. Since I came to TFT, I have been using software and tools such as IMPLAN, SQL, Excel (Solver), QGIS, R, and Python for project work. I also have more than ten years of experience with ArcGIS, SWAT (Soil and Water Assessment Tool), Stata, SAS, and @risk.

What’s the most important thing you’re working on right now?
Client and partner projects are the most important things I am working on. My focus is to estimate accurate results and explain them clearly in detail with conclusions from the perspective of agricultural and resource economics. Doing so helps us support partners and shareholders with accurate economic data for their decision-making processes.

What’s something that’s happening at the organization right now that you are very excited about?
This summer we gathered all staff in one location for a two-day retreat, which was exciting because I got to travel to be with team members.

What do you love about working for The Freshwater Trust?
It’s nice that I’m allowed to work remotely for TFT. I also enjoy working in agricultural economics and natural resource economics, as these are the fields in which I earned my master’s and PhD degrees. Working in these areas has been a passion of mine for almost 20 years, and I find it fascinating how much economic analysis impacts every conservation decision to find the right balance between what the economy needs and what the environment needs.

Last book you read or movie you watched?
The last book I read was Self-Compassion by Kristin Neff.

Last place you traveled.
I visited Portland, Oregon for work. Another fun trip I took included Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.

Vivian visiting Dollywood

Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
I hope to continue working in the fields of agricultural and natural resource economics.

What’s your number one piece of advice for someone trying to get into this field?
You should only get into this field if you are very interested in it. It requires years of course study, difficult comprehensive exams, quantitative analysis using math and statistics, and deep research to get an advanced degree.