2025 Water and Natural Resources Tour

Join the Nebraska Water Center and Central Nebraska Public Power and Irrigation District from November 2 – 7, 2025, as we experience urban water management, winter agriculture, and transboundary aquifer management. We'll go behind the scenes and meet the experts to get a first-hand look at water and natural resources in the American Southwest.

Registration includes: Meals, five nights of hotels, commercial transportation, on-board refreshments, and activities from 5:00 p.m. on Sunday, November 2, through 12:00 pm on Friday, November 7. There will be one meal on your own during the tour. The tour will begin and end in Phoenix, Arizona.

You will need to book your own transportation to and from Phoenix as it is not included in the tour registration costs.

Tour check-in is on Sunday, November 2, from 5:00 to 6:00 p.m. at the Hampton Inn in Gilbert, Arizona.

The full tour agenda will be available at watercenter.unl.edu.

Tour seats are limited, so act fast! Registrations are on a first-come, first served basis with payment required at the time of registration.

We welcome registrants from Nebraska, Arizona, and beyond. This tour is an opportunity to network and learn from water and ag professionals from different regions of the country. Continuing education credits for the tour are pending, and participants will receive a certificate of completion that can be used to self-submit continuing education credits.

The 2025 Water and Natural Resources Tour gives you exclusive access to research facilities, test farms, and tribal management of water and natural resources.

The tour will begin in Phoenix, Arizona, where we’ll spend two days learning about urban water management, wastewater treatment, and natural resource management in desert cities.

We will then spend a day in Maricopa, Arizona. Hosted by the University of Arizona Maricopa Agriculture Center, we will visit tribal farming operations and meet with researchers to discuss new findings in desert water management.

We will wrap up the tour in Yuma, Arizona. Hosted by the Yuma Center of Excellence for Desert Agriculture and the Yuma County Water Users' Association, we will experience a day in the life of the farm workers that produce 90% of the United States' winter vegetables - including the 5:00 a.m. start time and breakfast burritos in the field. We'll understand how Colorado River water management is crucial to our country’s food security.

This tour is sponsored by the Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute, the University of Nebraska Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources, HDR, Lower Platte South Natural Resource District, Olsson, Water Futures Partnership – Nebraska, and Reinke.

Host or Publisher Nebraska Water Center and Central Public Power and Irrigation District