Acts as a IWMI Country Representative -Uzbekistan, and Head of the Regional Representative Office for Central Asia. She is a researcher in the IWMI Research team on Water Governance and Political Economy (WGPE) focusing on Water law, International environmental law, water governance and diplomacy, transboundary cooperation. Previously, she acted as a Vice-president on International Cooperation and Sustainable Development at the Kazakh-German University (DKU) and UNESCO Chairholder for water management in Central Asia. Barbara is a member of International Law Association, International Water Law association, Center for International Sustainable Development Law (CISDL) and DAAD Scientific Committee on academic cooperation with post-soviet countries; Barbara is one of funders and the Editor in Chief of the Central Asian Journal of Water Research (CAJWR).