History

The Graduate program in Sanitation, Environment and Water Resources (SMARH, acronym in Portuguese) covers Master (MSc) and Doctoral (PhD) education and is offered by the School of Engineering of the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG). It is offered by the Departments ofSanitary and Environmental Engineering (DESA), and Hydraulics and Water Resources Engineering (EHR).

The Master's degree program, created in 1972, was then called 'Sanitary Engineering'. Later on, in 1992, the program expanded its main topics to incorporate environmental sciences and adopted the designation of 'Sanitation and Environment'. Since the program incorporated additional fields other than those covered by engineering, such as biology and applied social sciences, to some of its research lines, engineering was no longer mentioned as part of its name. In 1996, the name was once again altered to the current name: 'Sanitation, Environment and Water Resources', due to the incorporation of hydraulics and water resources areas. The Doctoral program was instituted in 2000.

The SMARH Program has grade 7 in the accreditation system of CAPES, the Brazilian federal agency in charge of assessing graduate programs in Brazil. Grade 7 is the maximum score a graduate program can obtain through the CAPES accreditation system. Itaccredits the excellence of the program in education and research, the high level of publications, the consistent international links and thepermanent collaboration with international institutions.