Biographies of members
Tanya Abrahamse
Chief Executive Officer South African Biodiversity Institute South Africa
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Tanya Abrahamse is a natural scientist with a wide range of management and leadership experience in environmental and developmental policies and processes, before and after the transition to democracy in 1994. She joined President Mandela’s Office to play a key role in the Reconstruction & Development Programme, later Environment & Tourism Department to lead transformation and head the Resource Use branch. Between 1994 and 2000 she participated in many international engagements representing her country. As head of the Tourism Business Council of South Africa from 2000 she sat on all key tourism bodies, led the Black Economic Empowerment process and advised on public/private partnership policy development. She received the African Tourism Achiever Award in 2005 and was her country’s nominee for SG of the World Tourism Organisation. In 2007 she was appointed the first CEO of the South African National Biodiversity Institute, a public entity responsible for Biodiversity research, policy support, knowledge & information, and the National Botanical Gardens. She has successfully restructured to meet mandate, transformed, and raised the profile of SANBI - at home and abroad. Over the past two decades she has sat on many advisory Boards, both nationally and internationally, in development, tourism, biodiversity, and leadership. |
Bertha Becker
Emeritus Professor Department of Geography Federal University of Rio de Janeiro Brazil
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Bertha K. Becker was graduated in Geography and History at the University of Brazil (1952) and got her Doctorship in Geography at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (1970). Her pos-doctoral studies were made at the Massachusetts Institute technology, Department of Urban Studies and Planning (1985). She is Emeritus Professor at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro where she coordinates the Laboratory on Territorial Management. She is a member of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences, Doctor Honoris Causa by the University of Lyon III (France), was the honored with the David Livingstone Centenary Medal from the American Geographical Society and many other medals in Brazil. Dr. Becker has been an active member of many scientific entities: she is senior researcher at the National Research Council for Science and technology, member of the Scientific Committee of Large Scale Biosphere-Atmosphere Experiment in the Amazon, was Vice President of the International Geographical Union (1996-2000) and Vice President of the International Advisory Group of the Pilot for the Protection of Brazilian’s Tropical Forests (1995-2005). She has also been collaborating in the elaboration of public policies as a consultant for the Ministeries of Science and Technology, environment and National Integration. Innumerable articles, books and chapters in books present the results of Dr. Becker’s research, which is focused in Political Geography of The Amazon and Brazil.
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Rohan D'Souza
Assistant Professor Centre for Studies in Science Policy Jawaharlal Nehru University India
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Rohan D’Souza is Assistant Professor at the Centre for Studies in Science Policy. He is the author of Drowned and Dammed: Colonial Capitalism and Flood control in Eastern India (1803-1946), Oxford University Press, 2006 and has jointly edited a volume entitled The British Empire and the Natural World: Environmental Encounters in South Asia, Oxford University Press, 2011. His interests and research publications cover themes in environmental history, conservation, ecological politics, sustainable development and modern technology. He had held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Agrarian Studies Program (Yale University) and was the Ciriacy-Wantrup fellow (University of California, Berkeley). He was also a Senior Research Associate at the Centre for World Environmental History (University of Sussex) and visiting fellow at the Resources Management Asia-Pacific (Australian National University). |
Karl Jones
Executive Diector Catastrophe Management Services, Asia Pacific and Australia Willis Re Australia, Willis Group Australia
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Karl Jones leads the Catastrophe Management Services team at Willis Reinsurance for Australia, New Zealand and the Asia-Pacific region. Based in Sydney, he has worked in the field of catastrophe risk management for the past 15 years, working with insurers, reinsurers and governments. He has been closely involved with the design of catastrophe models and risk management projects during that time and has also co-ordinated the catastrophe modelling for a number of major global insurers. Before moving to Sydney seven years ago, Karl led the international Catastrophe Management team at Willis Re in London. He has a degree in Geography from the University of Cambridge and is an Associate of the Chartered Insurance Institute.
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Rik Leemans
Director Environmental Systems Analysis Group, Wageningen University Netherlands
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Rik Leemans (1957) heads the Environmental Systems Analysis group and directs the WIMEK graduate school of Wageningen University. He chairs the Science Committee of the Earth System Science Partnership (ESSP). He plays a pivotal role in several committees concerned with various aspects of global change and leads several interdisciplinary research projects to develop and apply integrated earth system models. He contributes to the assessments of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. His early studies at Uppsala University (Sweden) and the International Institute of Applied System Analyses (IIASA, Austria) emphasised modelling the structure and dynamics of boreal forests. During the nineties, he led the development and application of a comprehensively integrated earth system model, IMAGE, at the Dutch National Institute of Public Health and the Environment (RIVM). His main current research interests concern biodiversity, land-use dynamics, biogeochemical cycles, ecosystem services, vulnerability and sustainable development. Prof. Dr. Leemans has published many papers on a wide range of global-change topics, is member of editorial boards of scientific journals such as Climatic Change and Solutions and is editor in-chief of Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability. |
Peter Liss
Professor University of East Anglia UK
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Peter Liss is an environmental scientist specialising in research on the interaction between the oceans and the atmosphere, in particular the role of the oceans as sources and sinks of trace gases and their roles in climate and air quality. He served as chairman of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP) for 5 years and was subsequently Chair of its Surface Ocean – Lower Atmosphere Study (SOLAS). Prof. Liss was a member of the UK’s Natural Environment Research Council for 5 years, chairing both its Marine and Atmospheric Sciences Boards. Until recently he was a member of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution. He currently chairs the European Research Council’s ‘Earth System Sciences’ Advanced Grants Panel. Prof. Liss was the first recipient of the Challenger Society Medal, has been awarded the Plymouth Marine Sciences Medal and the John Jeyes Medal of the Royal Society of Chemistry, and is Guest Professor of the Ocean University of Qingdao, China. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and was created Commander of the British Empire in 2008 for services to science.
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Diana Liverman
Co-Director Institute of the Environment University of Arizona US
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Diana Liverman is the co-director of the Institute of the Environment at The University of Arizona and a Regents Professor in the School of Geography and Development. She is also affiliated with Oxford University as a visiting professor of Environmental Policy and Development and senior research fellow in the Environmental Change Institute. Her degrees are from University College London (BA), University of Toronto (MA) and UCLA (PhD). Her research focuses on the human and social dimensions of environmental issues including vulnerability and adaptation to climate change, environmental change and food security, climate policy and governance, climate and the arts, and environment and development. She was recently awarded the Founders Gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society and distinguished scholarship honors from the Association of American Geographers. She has been an active member of national and international advisory committees on global change including chairing the US National Academies committees on the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change and Informing America’s Climate Choices. Internationally she chaired the scientific advisory committee international Global Environmental Change and Food Systems (GECAFS) program and has been a member of scientific advisory committees for the Inter American Institute and the IHDP Earth Systems Governance project. |
Harold Mooney
Professor Stanford University US
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Harold A. MOONEY is the Paul S. Achilles Professor of Environmental Biology at Stanford University. He received his PhD from Duke University. He has served as President of the Ecological Society of America, President of the American Institute of Biological Science, and Secretary General of the International Council for Science. He was Scientific Panel Co-Chair of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment from 2000 to 2005 and is now Chair of DIVERSITAS, an international program on biodiversity science. Mooney is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society. He has received numerous awards, including the Tyler Prize, the Blue Planet Prize, the Ramon Margalef Prize in Ecology and Environmental Sciences and the BBVA Foundation Award for Scientific Research in Ecology and Conservation Biology. Mooney is currently engaged in research on the impacts of global change on terrestrial ecosystems, especially on productivity and biodiversity; the invasion of non-indigenous plant species; and the environmental and social consequences of industrialized animal production systems. |
Isabelle Niang
Maître de conferences University Cheikh Anta Diop of Dakar Senegal
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Isabelle NIANG is professor at the University of Chiekh Anta Diop in Dakar since 1996, and has been posted since 1984. An expert in coastal erosions and climate change; coordinating lead author of the chapters on ‘Afrique du Groupe de travail II’ for IPCC, in the 4th and 5th reports. Since 2008, she has been coordinating regional project ACCC (Adaptation au Changements Climatiques et Côtiers en Afrique de l’Ouest) and is based in BREDA/UNESCO.
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Karen O’Brien
Professor University of Oslo Norway
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Karen O’Brien is a Professor in the Department of Sociology and Human Geography at the University of Oslo, Norway. She holds a PhD in Geography from the Pennsylvania State University, and an MS degree in Land Resources from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research focuses on climate change impacts, vulnerability and adaptation and the implications for human security. She has also researched the interactions between environmental change and globalization processes. She is currently interested in how transdisciplinary and integral approaches to global change research can contribute to a better understanding of how societies both create and respond to change, and in particular how beliefs, values and worldviews influence human responses to climate change. She currently leads a large interdisciplinary social science project on climate change adaptation in Norway (PLAN).
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Hermann Requardt
Chief Executive Officer Siemens AG, Healthcare Sector Germany
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Hermann Requardt, 56, is a member of the Managing Board of Siemens AG and Chief Executive Officer of the Healthcare Sector. After completing his studies in physics and philosophy at the Darmstadt University of Technology and Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt and receiving a doctorate in biophysics, he worked at the Institute of Aerospace Medicine at the German Aerospace Center. In 1984 he joined the Medical Technology Group of Siemens AG, where he was responsible for projects in the Magnetic Resonance division. He was appointed head of the division in 1995. From 2001 to 2006, as a member of the Executive Management of the Medical Solutions Group, he was responsible for several areas, including technological development. In 2006 he became a Member of the Siemens’ Managing Board and head of Corporate Technology. He was additionally appointed as the Sector Healthcare CEO in 2008. Since 2006 he is an honorary professor in physics of the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt. |
Johan Rockström
Executive Director Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) Sweden |
Johan Rockström is the Executive Director of the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) and the Stockholm Resilience Centre. He is a Professor in Natural Resource Management at Stockholm University and a guest Professor at the Beijing Normal University. He is a leading international scientist on global water resources and sustainable development, with more than 15 years experience of research on agriculture, water resources and ecosystems, with more than 50 peer reviewed scientific articles and several books in fields of global environmental change, resilience and sustainability, agricultural water management, watershed hydrology, global water resources and food production, and eco-hydrology. He has served as advisor to several international organizations, governments and the European Union on sustainability and development, and is a frequented key-note speaker to several international research, policy and development arenas on sustainable development. |
Roberto Sánchez
Professor Department of Urban and Environmental Studies El Colegio de la Frontera Norte Mexico Mexico |
Roberto Sánchez Rodríguez is currently a professor in the Department of Urban and Environmental Studies at El Colegio de la Frontera Norte, a research institution in Mexico. He is also an emeritus professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences of the University of California, Riverside. His current research focuses on the interactions between climate change, urbanization, and development where he studies the vulnerability and adaptation of urban areas to climate variability and climate change. Prof. Sánchez Rodríguez is Co-Chair of the IHDP core project on Urbanization and Global Environmental Change (UGEC). He is a lead author of Chapter 15, Adaptation Planning and Implementation, IPCC Working Group II Fifth Assessment Report (AR5), and a lead author of chapter 3 on land of UNEP’s Global Environmental Outlook (GEO 5).
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Martin Visbeck
Deputy Director Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences Kiel University Germany
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Martin Visbeck received his Ph.D from Kiel University in Physical Oceanography on research about deep ocean convection in 1993. During a postdoctoral fellowship at MIT his research interest focused on the interaction between ocean eddies and deep convection regions and their respective heat and density transports. As a Research Scientist at LDEO and Associate Professor at Columbia University, New York, his interest shifted to more general aspects of the ocean’s role in the climate system including work on the North Atlantic Oscillation and Deep Water formation off Antarctica. Since October 2004 he has held the chair in Physical Oceanography at the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences at the University in Kiel. His current research is concerned with ocean and climate variability and change with particular emphasis on the circulation of the Subpolar North Atlantic, climate-biogeochemical interactions in the tropical ocean, observations of ocean circulation and mixing using modern robotic platforms including profiling floats and gliders, and development of ocean observatories for long-term observations in the water column. Prof. Visbeck has served on several national and international committees. He is Speaker of the Kiel Cluster of Excellence "The Future Ocean". |
Robert Watson
Chief Scientific Adviser Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) Department for Environment UK
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Robert Watson’s career has evolved from research scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory: California Institute of Technology, to a US Federal Government programs manager/director at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), to a scientific/policy advisor in the US Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), White House, to a scientific advisor, manager and chief scientist at the World Bank, to a Chair of Environmental Sciences at the University of East Anglia, the Director for Strategic Direction for the Tyndall centre, and Chief Scientific Advisor to the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. In parallel to his formal positions he has chaired, co-chaired or directed international scientific, technical and economic assessments of stratospheric ozone depletion, biodiversity/ecosystems (the GBA and MA), climate change (IPCC) and agricultural S&T (IAASTD). Professor Watson’s areas of expertise include managing and coordinating national and international environmental programmes, research programmes and assessments; establishing science and environmental policies - specifically advising governments and civil society on the policy implications of scientific information and policy options for action; and communicating scientific, technical and economic information to policymakers. During the last twenty years he has received numerous national and international awards recognising his contributions to science and the science-policy interface, including in 2003 - Honorary “Companion of the Order of Saint Michael and Saint George” from the United Kingdom; 2010 – the Blue Planet Prize and 2011 being elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society. |
Tandong Yao
Director Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research Chinese Academy of Sciences China
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Tandong Yao is the Director of the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chairman of Chinese Society of Tibetan Plateau Research. He was also the Director of Lanzhou Institute of Glaciology and Geocryology, Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Director of Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Dr. Tandong Yao has be working on gliciers and environment. He has reconstructed climate variability on the Tibetan Plateau over the past 100ka and greenhouse which showed dramtic increasing since industrial revolution. He has been studying the corelation between temperature and oxygen isotope in preicpitation. He has also found that glacier has retreated dramatically under recent global warming. Dr. Yao has been invited by international conferences and workshops held in the United States, Switzerland, Japan, Germany, Taiwan, Thailand, Nepal, and Norway. At the same time, he plays a key role in international cooperatrion in Tibetan Plateau research and bridges international communication on Tibet research. He has organized international programs. Most of the programs he has implemented are organized internationally with American, French, Japanese and Russian scientists. He is now organizing the Third Pole Environment (TPE). |
Stephen Zebiak
Director Climate Services Initiative at ThColumbia University US
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Stephen Zebiak is Director of the Climate Services Initiative at the Earth Institute at Columbia University, and the International Research Institute for Climate and Society (IRI). He leads activities of the Climate Services Partnership, an informal collaborative platform to advance knowledge, tools, and capacities in the delivery of science-based climate services to inform practical decision and policy making. Previously, Dr. Zebiak was Director-General of IRI, leading an inter-disciplinary team of over 40 scientists specializing in climate prediction, agriculture, health, water, economics and development policy. Dr. Zebiak has worked in the area of ocean-atmosphere interaction and climate variability since completing his Ph.D. at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1984. He and Dr. Mark Cane authored the first dynamical model used to predict El Niño successfully. He has published extensively in journals such as Science, Nature, the International Journal of Climatology, and has served as an advisor to a range of US and international climate science research programs. Dr. Zebiak is a Fellow of the American Meteorological Society.
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Ex-Officio Members |
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Joseph Alcamo
Chief Scientist United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Kenya
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Joseph ALCAMO is Chief Scientist of the United Nations Environment Programme and the first Chief Scientist appointed within the UN system. He is on leave as Director of the Center for Environmental Systems Research at the University of Kassel, Germany and Professor of Environmental Systems Science and Engineering. His main scientific contributions have been in the areas of integrated environmental modelling, integrated assessment, systems analysis of the global environment, and techniques of environmental scenario analysis. He has held longer scientific appointments at the International Institute for Applied Systems in Austria, and the National Institute of Public Health and the Environment in The Netherlands, and visiting posts at Stanford University, the National Institute of Advanced Studies in Bangalore, and Stellenbosch University in South Africa. Alcamo was winner of the international Max Planck Research Prize for achievements in global change research. He is an American citizen. |
Irina Bokova
Director-General United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) France
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Irina Bokova, the Director-General of UNESCO from 2009, elected for four years, was Ambassador of the Republic of Bulgaria to France and Monaco, Personal Representative of the Bulgarian President to the "Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie" and Permanent Delegate to UNESCO from 2005 to 2009. Born in 1952, she obtained an MBA from the Moscow State Institute of International Relations and studied at the universities of Maryland and Harvard in the USA. During her long and distinguished career, she also served as Bulgaria's representative to the United Nations and as her country's Secretary of State for European integration and Foreign Minister. Ms Bokova has long promoted the transition to European integration. As Founder and Chairperson of the European Policy Forum, she worked to overcome divisions in Europe and promote the values of dialogue, diversity, human dignity and rights. Back to the list
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Heide Hackmann
Executive Director International Social Science Council (ISSC) France |
Heide Hackmann read for a M.Phil in contemporary social theory at the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom, and holds a PhD in science and technology studies from the University of Twente in the Netherlands . She has worked as a science policy maker, researcher and consultant in the Netherlands, Germany, the United Kingdom and South Africa. Her research has focused on science policy studies, the governance of science, and research evaluation. Heide was elected to the position of Secretary-General of the ISSC by the Council's General Assembly in November 2006.
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Gretchen Kalonji
Assistant Director General for Natural Sciences United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) France
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Gretchen KALONJI is Assistant Director General for Natural Sciences in UNESCO, France. She is also a professor of Department of Electrical Engineering in University of California, Santa Cruz, USA. Gretchen Kalonji assumed the position of Assistant Director General for Natural Sciences at UNESCO effective July 1, 2010. Prior to joining UNESCO, starting in 2005, Kalonji served in various leadership roles at the University of California, including as Director of International Strategy Development at the UC Office of the President, where her responsibility was to lead in the design and implementation of the first coordinated and comprehensive international strategy for the ten-campus UC system, and as Director of Systemwide Research Development. Kalonji came to the UC from the University of Washington, where she served as Kyocera Professor of Materials Science from 1990 - 2005. Prior to joining UW, Kalonji served as Assistant and Associate Professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at MIT, where she earned her B.Sc. degree in 1980 and her Ph.D in 1982. Professor Kalonji’s areas of materials science expertise include symmetry constraints on the structure and properties of crystalline defects, phase transformations and microstructural evolution. Kalonji also has extensive experience in innovations in science and engineering education, as well as in new models for international research collaboration. Her work, both in materials science and in research and educational innovation, has been recognized with multiple honors and awards. She holds or has held visiting faculty appointments at the Max Planck Institute (Stuttgart), the University of Paris, Tohoku University, Sichuan University, Tsinghua University and the newly established Peking University Graduate School in Shenzhen. Back to the list
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Albert van Jaarsveld
Co-Chair Belmont Forum South Africa
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Albert van Jaarsveld Chief Executive Officer of the National Research Foundation. His distinguished career in research, teaching and leadership include academic and management positions at the Universities of Pretoria and Stellenbosch, as Dean of Science, Adjunct Professor: Environmental Studies Programme at Dartmouth College, USA, Vice President and more recently, CEO of the National Research Foundation. He obtained his PhD in Zoology from the University of Pretoria. Pursued post-doctoral studies and research in Conservation Biology and Global security in Australia and the UK and has published in excess of 100 primary papers, including highly cited works in Science and Nature. Dr van Jaarsveld is recipient of 16 Professional Awards, including awards for the most outstanding young scientist under the age of 35; Outstanding Academic Achiever award; and the Chancellor’s award for Excellence in Tuition and Learning from the University of Pretoria; University of Stellenbosch Vice-Chancellors award for Research Excellence; and the Centenary Medal for distinguished career in research, teaching and leadership from the “SA Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns”. He is co-recipient of the International Zayed prize for the Environment, a member of several professional and academic organisations and associations, including being a Fellow of the Royal Society of South Africa and an elected member of the South African Academy of Sciences. On the international front, Dr van Jaarsveld has served as co-chair of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment follow-up: Sub-global assessments; member of the IUCS nominations committee; IPBES science focal point and Chair: G8 science ministers Group of Senior Officials on Global Researth Infrastructure. |
Patrick Monfray
Co-Chair Belmont Forum France
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Patrick Monfray, research director at CNRS, was initially trained in quantum physics in French high schools (Supelec and Ecole Normale Supérieure). He completed his PhD on CO2 storage by the ocean at the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (Gif, FR), followed by a postdoc at Max-Planck-Institut für Meteorologie (Hamburg, GE). In the 1990s, he developed French WMO atmospheric CO2 monitoring network and innovative coupled climate-carbon simulations, now reference for IPCC. He co-founded the Integrated Marine Biogeochemistry and Ecosystem Research within ICSU/IGBP and SCOR. He had made more than 170 peer-review papers or communications. In 2003, he took the direction of the Laboratory of Space Geophysics and Oceanography (Toulouse, FR), and in 2007 the direction of Ocean-Atmosphere Department at CNRS/INSU (Paris), supervising 30 French laboratories. In 2010, he joined the French National Research Agency (ANR) to supervise “Global Environmental Changes and Societies” programs. He is involved in European and international coordination between research organizations and agencies to fund Earth system research for global sustainability. He is now deputy head of the ANR Department on Environment and Biological Resources, and he represents both CNRS and ANR within IGFA/Belmont Forum (as co-Chair since 2012). |
Jakob Rhyner
Vice-Rector, United Nations University(UNU); Director, UNU-EHS, Institute for Environment and Human Security Germany
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Jakob Rhyner joined the United Nations University in 2010. He holds a PhD and diploma in theoretical physics from ETH Zurich. He is a member of the Agricultural Faculty of the University of Bonn. He has been active in numerous professional organizations and boards, such as the Fachleute Naturgefahren Schweiz (Experts Natural Hazards Switzerland), the Group of European Avalanche Warning Services, and research project evaluation boards of the European Commission. He has various international experiences, including as a guest scientist at L.D. Landau Institute of Theoretical Physics in Moscow, Former Soviet Union (1986), and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1990-91). 1988 – 2001, he was active in industrial research (energy technology). Since 2001, he served as the Head of the WSL Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research (SLF) in Davos, Switzerland, and its Research Unit Warning and Prevention. He also acted as a member of the Directorial Board of the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape WSL, to which SLF belongs. At WSL/SLF, he has been involved in the area of natural hazards safety and risk management. |
Paul Rouse
Head of Environment, Energy and Food Research, Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) UK
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Paul Rouse leads the development of the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council’s (ESRC) research investment in the areas of environmental change, energy, global food security and water. He has 20 years experience of developing and implementing strategic, directive research investment, predominantly within the social sciences but also the physical sciences through the and Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). Paul has personally commissioned in excess of £80M of new research and currently oversees a portfolio of approximately £60M of strategic research investment. He works closely with a wide range of government and other agencies developing the future social science environmental change research agenda in the UK.
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Steven Wilson
Executive Director International Council of Science (ICSU) France
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Steven Wilson is the ICSU Executive Director. He took up his position in April 2012. Previously, from 1998 to 2012, he worked for the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), the main funder of environmental research in the UK. At NERC, prior to a period as the interim Chief Executive, he was the Director, Strategy & Partnerships with responsibility for the development and implementation of NERC Science & Innovation Strategy. As part of his role, he helped found the Belmont Forum of international environmental research funders, later becoming its co-chair and secured a number of national and international partnerships. Prior to this he was NERC Director of Earth Observation and, in this period, he led the British National Space Centre Earth Observation activities, represented the UK environmental science community at the European Space Agency (ESA), as well as Chairing the ESA Earth Observation Programme Board. Steven has also worked for the UK Met Office (1995 to 1998) where he developed and used simulators for future satellite instrumentation on the Office's Hercules research aircraft. Steven took his first degree at St John's College, Oxford (Chemistry) and his PhD at the University of Bristol, where his research focused on molecular photodissociation dynamics.
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Observers |
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Ghassem Asrar
Director, World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) Switzerland
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Ghassem R. Asrar is currently the Director of the World Climate Research Program (WCRP) in Geneva, Switzerland. Prior to this position, he served as the Deputy Administrator for Natural Resources and Agricultural Systems with Agricultural Research Service (ARS), of the U.S. Department of Agriculture from 2006-2008, after 20 years of service with the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Dr. Asrar earned graduate degrees in civil engineering and environmental physics from Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan. He conducted research and trained undergraduate and post-graduate students for nine years in academia prior to joining NASA as a senior scientist in 1987. Dr. Asrar is the recipient of U.S. Presidential Distinguished Executive Award (2002), an elected Fellow of American Meteorological Society (2001), and IEEE (2000). He has received numerous awards and honors, including the NASA Exceptional Performance Award in 1997, the AIAA Goddard Memorial Lecture Medal in 1998, NASA Exceptional Service Medal, 1999, NASA Distinguished Leadership Medal, 2000, the Space System Award from the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 2006, and Distinguished Alumni Award from the Michigan State University, 2008. |
Anantha Duraiappah
Executive Director, International Human Dimensions Programme (IHDP) Germany
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Anantha Duraiappah is the Executive Director of the International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change (IHDP) in Bonn, Germany. He is an experienced environmental-development economist whose work largely focuses on the equity of access and use of ecosystem services. Prof. Duraiappah received his PhD in economics from the University of Texas in Austin, USA and currently holds a visiting professorship at Beijing Normal University, China in coupled systems modelling. He has published books on environmental and developmental issues as well as numerous articles in peer reviewed journals, and is presently an associate editor for “The Journal of Human Development and Capacity”. In his previous post as Chief of the Ecosystem Services and Economics Unit of the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP), Prof. Duraiappah was involved in the initiation of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) and has since then played a pivotal role in its approval process. Prof. Duraiappah continues to successfully incorporate his expertise in science-policy interaction, economics, development and ecosystem services into his work at IHDP. |
Anne Larigauderie
Executive Director, DIVERSITAS, an international programme of biodiversity science France
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Anne Larigauderie is Executive Director of DIVERSITAS, the international programme dedicated to biodiversity science. She obtained a PhD in plant ecology, from the Université des Sciences et Techniques du Languedoc, Montpellier, France, in 1985. As plant ecologist, she spent ten years performing experimental and field work at different institutions: study of gas exchange in first pilot project performing CO2 enrichment of natural ecosystems in the arctic tundra (San Diego State University, USA), of root competition for nutrient in California grasslands (University of California – Davis, USA), of responses of grass species to various scenarios of elevated CO2 and temperature (Duke University, USA), and of the adaptation of dark respiration of alpine plant species to future elevated temperatures (University of Basel, Switzerland). In 1996 she became the coordinator of the Swiss Priority Programme on Biodiversity, and the scientific adviser to the Swiss delegation to the Convention on Biological Diversity. In 1999, she joined the International Council for Science (ICSU, Paris) as Environment Science Officer, in charge of ICSU’s portfolio of environmental programmes. She was appointed Executive Director of DIVERSITAS in 2002, and has been working since then on building a strong international programme for biodiversity science, under UNESCO and ICSU. She is also interested in strengthening the science-policy interface for biodiversity, and is playing a role in the establishment of GEO BON, the global observing system for biodiversity, and IPBES, the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.
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Jeremiah LengoasaDeputy Secretary-General, World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Switzerland |
Jeremiah Lengoasa took up his duties as Deputy Secretary-General of WMO on 1 March 2010. He held the position of Assistant Secretary-General of WMO from 8 August 2005 to 28 February 2010. Mr Lengoasa holds Masters degrees in Climatology and Development Management from Witwatersrand University, Johannesburg. Mr Lengoasa was for several years a teacher and a university lecturer in Geography and environmental studies. He served in the South African public service in Environment, Environmental Regulations, and Environmental Quality and Protection, followed by a period in the private sector as Senior Manager at a bank in Sandton. Frin 2003 to 2005, he was Chief Executive Officer of the South African Weather Service and Permanent Representative of South Africa with WMO and served as member of the WMO Executive Council.
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Sybil Seitzinger
Executive Director, International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme Sweden
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Sybil Seitzinger has been Executive Director of the ICSU-sponsored International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme since 2008. Sybil Seitzinger has been Executive Director of the ICSU-sponsored International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme since 2008.
Professor Seitzinger's areas of expertise include biogeochemistry, nutrient dynamics, and land/atmosphere/ocean interactions. She has been Director of the Rutgers/NOAA Cooperative Marine Education and Research Program, Rutgers University and has been a visiting Professor at Rutgers University, Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences since 1994. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Rhode Island School of Oceanography, and then worked as Senior Scientist at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. In 2011, Seitzinger was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Professor Seitzinger was a member of the IGBP Scientific Committee 2003-2008.
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