Resource Speakers
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.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Environment, Urban Development
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.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Water
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Finance
Agnetha Vave-Karamui worked as an environmental/forestry advocacy officer with the Solomon Islands NGO, Environmental Concerns Action Network. She then joined the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change, Disaster Management, and Meteorology in 2008. She comes from the Western Province of Solomon Islands, and holds a bachelor of science degree in environmental science from the University of the South Pacific.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Environment
Mr. Ahmed Kamal is the Chief Engineering Adviser and Chairman Federal Flood Commission of the Ministry of Water Resources, Government of Pakistan. He has over 30 years of professional experience in the field of water resources management, flood control planning and management, DRR, flood forecasting and warning systems, and disaster risk insurance. He has worked on the implementation of National Flood Protection Plans II & III, and Flood Protection Sector Projects, I & II. Mr.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management
Alberto Alonso obtained his PhD in Geography in 2009 with a thesis devoted to Earth Observation and Digital Elevation Models and Orthoimagery applied to cartography. He is a geospatial information scientist with long experience in international and national research projects playing different technical and managerial roles. As a geospatial data scientist, he has more than 10 years of experience in geospatial and earth observation analysis and representation, having worked for the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre and the European Environment Agency.
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management, Environment
Albrecht Weerts is an expert on data model integration and hydrological forecasting at Deltares. He has been leading research and development projects on data assimilation techniques for improving flood forecasting system. He is also a Professor of Hydrologic Predictability at Wageningen University, Hydrology and Quantitative Water Management Group.
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management, ICT, Water
Alessio Giardino is a climate adaptation and disaster risk management specialist with over 18 years’ experience of professional experience in the water sector, including both specialized consultancy and research. His current focus at ADB is on the development and implementation of innovative methodologies and techniques to enhance climate resilience in water projects.
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management
Alexander Fowler has been working in the field of disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation since completing his undergraduate degree in Disaster Management in 2011. He has worked on resilience building projects in Lao PDR, Bhutan, Maldives, and Sri Lanka with a specific focus on mainstreaming disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation into development planning processes.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management
Alexandra Galperin has over 25 years of experience in Disaster Risk Management. Before joining ADB’s Pacific Regional Department in 2020, she worked for the Red Cross, the United Nations, and as a consultant for multiple technical, donor, humanitarian, and development organizations balancing headquarter and field assignments. Her experience of large-scale disaster response and recovery operations at the beginning of her career convinced her that she wanted to focus on preventive and adaptive action.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management
Alison Sneddon is a Disaster Risk Reduction Advisor at Practical Action where she works in the key areas of research and knowledge management. The focus of this work is on early warning systems and climate information services, with recent and current studies investigating the roles of gender, probabilistic forecasting and digital mapping in EWS. Before joining Practical Action, Alison spent two years in Pakistan where she delivered community-based development projects in flood-prone and conflict-affected areas.
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management, Urban Development, Water
Mr. Fan Zhang (Allen) is an environmental economics scholar. He is the founder of the Hunan Innovative Low Carbon Center, the first private non-profit carbon neutrality think-tank in China with the provincial climate change authority as the business unit.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Urban Development
Amir joined the ADB as a Young Professional (YP) in 2018. He has extensive experience working on the design, development, and evaluation of social protection, human development and women’s empowerment projects. Prior to joining the ADB, Amir worked at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) as an applied microeconomist on a series of social protection, health and education initiatives designed to address poverty, vulnerability, food and nutritional security, and human development.
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management
Amit is the Executive Director of Integrated Urban Transport, WRI India. He is based in Delhi and provides vision and leadership to all transport initiatives across WRI India, managing relationships with partners and stakeholders.
Amit has around 20 years of experience in the field of urban transport, non-motorised transport, public transportation, road safety, electric mobility and urban development. Amit is part of various national and international committees on transportation and urban development.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Governance and Public Sector Management, Transport, Urban Development
Ms Ananya Basu is currently Director at the Pacific Department (PARD) of the Asian Development Bank (ADB). She works on public sector management operations in PARD, and with the economics team on the Asian Development Outlook and the biannual Pacific Economic Monitor publications.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Environment, Finance
After serving in the Armed Forces of the Philippines for five years, Angelique Songco worked as a diving professional on liveaboards boats in the Tubbataha Reefs for ten (10) years. She represented a local NGO in the multi-sectoral Tubbataha Protected Area Management Board. In 2001, she headed Tubbataha Management Office and became the first park manager of Tubbataha. She completed her master’s degree in Environment, Development and Policy from the University of Sussex, England. She has been named Hero of the Environment by WWFPhilippines twice.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Environment
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management, ICT
Anna Marie Karaos is the Associate Director of John J Carroll Institute on Church and Social Issues, a non-government organization specializing in advocacy-oriented research on issues affecting the urban poor, farmers, fisherfolk, and children in the Philippines. She is also a faculty member of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the Ateneo de Manila University.
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management
Dr. Annadel Salvio Cabanban is the Head of Office of Wetlands International Philippines and Program Manager for To Plant or Not to Plant and Building with Nature Initiative Asia – Philippines. She is trained as a Marine Biologist at the University of the Philippines, Quezon City, and at James Cook University, Townsville City (Australia).
Topic(s): Agriculture and Natural Resources, Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Energy, Environment
Anne Orquiza is a Senior Public Management Officer (Disaster Risk Management) in the Asian Development Bank. She works across ADB supporting disaster-resilient development and post-disaster recovery. Before joining ADB in 2020, she worked for over a decade with the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade managing disaster risk management, climate change adaptation and urban resilience programs, as well as emergency response and humanitarian assistance in the Philippines.
Topic(s): Capacity Development, Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Governance and Public Sector Management, Knowledge Management
Nijhof has extensive experience in the worlds of both government and business. As the Director-General of Water at the Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management (now Infrastructure and Water Management), she was responsible for water policy in the Netherlands. She then turned her hand to a business career as the CEO of consultancy and engineering firm Tauw. Presently, she is figurehead Top Sector Water & Maritiem and chair of the Netherlands Water Partnership (NWP).
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management, Environment, Urban Development, Water
Dr. Anthony Green has over 35 years of professional experience in all forms of flood risk management in the UK in Asia. Tony has lived in the Mekong region since 2009 and manages the JBA office in Phnom Penh, Cambodia
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management, Water
Dr Anthony Kiem is a hydroclimatologist. His research focus is on understanding the drivers and impacts of climate variability and change in the Asia-Pacific region. Of particular interest are hydrological extremes and how these may change in the future. Anthony has extensive experience in characterising impacts of climate variability and change, seasonal/interannual forecasting, extreme event (e.g. flood, drought, bushfire etc.) risk analysis, hydrological modelling, stochastic modelling, and water resources management.
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management
Antonette Anaban is an Economist and an Environmental Planner.
Topic(s): Disaster Risk Management, Urban Development
Antonia Yulo-Loyzaga or Toni is the President of the National Resilience Council (NRC), a science and technology-based public-private partnership aimed at the implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, the Sustainable Development Goals, and the Paris Climate Agreement. She is a member of the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction’s (UNDRR) Global Science and Technology Advisory Group (GSTAG) and Asia Pacific Science Technology Academia Advisory Group (AP-STAAG).
Topic(s): Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management