Resource Speakers

A. Lin Goodwin (葛文林) is the Thomas More Brennan Chair of Education at the Lynch School of Education and Human Development. Prior to joining Boston College, she was Dean of the Faculty(School) of Education at the University of Hong Kong (2017-2022) and Vice Dean at Teachers College, Columbia University (TCCU) in New York (2011-2017), where she also held the Evenden Foundation Chair in Education.

Aage Jorgensen has for the past decade been Program Manager at the Nordic Development Fund (NDF) where he has helped build up a portfolio of climate change projects. He works with community-based adaptation, climate-resilient infrastructure, and urban development and is responsible for the NDF support to several countries in Africa, Asia, and Central America.

Aamir Riaz is a Programme Officer in International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and is currently part of the team at its Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific. 

Aape Pohjavirta is the Founder and President of Funzi, a mobile learning service. Funzi gives the world’s billions of mobile users access to motivating and useful learning. An opportunity to develop skills to build a better tomorrow. High quality, relevant courses delivered with a combination of effective pedagogy and an engaging experience

In his role at Funzi, Aape has become a recognized industry leader with a vision of how science, technology, and innovation will contribute to the achievement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Mr. Aaron Dennis is a Social Development Specialist with ADB's South Asia Energy Division. Prior to joining ADB, he worked with the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman for IFC and MIGA as well as with a private consultancy specializing in Indigenous Peoples development. As a practitioner, Aaron is interested in leveraging emerging technologies to foster inclusive and equitable project design, to promote transparency and accountability, and to enable results-oriented performance and service delivery for clients and communities.

Abdul Abiad oversees the ADB’s flagship publication, the Asian Development Outlook. From 2000 to 2015, he was with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington DC, where he worked on the IMF’s World Economic Outlook. His research areas include financial sector development and international financial integration, fiscal policy, exchange rates and trade, economic resilience, and infrastructure. He has a PhD in Economics from University of Pennsylvania

Abdul Malik Sadat Idris is the Director for Irrigation and Water Resources of Ministry of National Development Planning/BAPPE, Indonesia.

Mr. Idris was a Panelist at the Resilient Infrastructure Recovery and Building Back Better by JICA, Japan, 2020. He was a Speaker at the Japan Exposure Visit by World Bank, Japan, 2019; Speaker at the 3rd World Irrigation Forum (WIF3) & 70th IEC Meeting by INACID, Indonesia, 2019; Speaker at the Water Week of World Bank, USA, 2019; and Speaker at the 27th Annual CCPP Conference on Public-Private Partnerships, Canada, 2019.

Mr. Abdur Rouf Talukder joined the Bangladesh Civil Service in February 1988 (BCS 1985 batch). He worked in a wide range of government positions in his long illustrious career but his specialization in public finance and economic management has brought him back to Finance Division at almost every rank of his career. He worked more than 18 years in Finance Division before elevating to the position of Finance Secretary on 17 July 2018.

Abdul Salam is passionate about development and humanitarian work. He has more than 10 years of experience field of water sanitation and habitat and is a continuous learner. Through combining the competencies, skills, upgrade information and field experience he regularly contemplates the new challenges and delivers.

Abhijit Banerjee was educated at the University of Calcutta, Jawaharlal Nehru University, and Harvard University. He is currently the Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics at MIT. Banerjee is a past president of the Bureau for Research in the Economic Analysis of Development, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Econometric Society, and has been a Guggenheim Fellow and an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow.

Abhinav Bhushan, as Director for South Asia of the ICC Arbitration and ADR International Court of Arbitration, ICC, focuses on helping companies, investors, and attorneys in the region understand how they can efficiently resolve international commercial disputes by raising their awareness on the ICC's Dispute Resolution Services and its commitment to international arbitration, the procedure, and thought leadership.