Abul works on food security and rural development issues, contributes to ADB’s agenda of sustainable development, and supports the ADB-wide knowledge management process on food security and sustainability.

Diwakar oversees ADB's assistance to private sector projects with a clear development impact but limited access to capital. Gupta was Managing Director and Chief Financial Officer of the State Bank of India, where he was responsible for setting strategies and direction alongside other members of the State Bank’s Central Management Committee. He joined the State Bank of India in 1974 and held several positions at its various units and subsidiaries. 

Carolyn has diverse experience in change management, knowledge management, and communications work for development and research organizations. She is currently focusing on the people side of technology for the Digital Innovation Sandbox Program. Her current initiative is developing the Digital Fitness 101 Program, which aims to equip ADB’s employees with a basic understanding of digital technologies. Carolyn’s career has spanned agriculture, climate change, sustainability, communications, knowledge, change, and digital innovation.

Mr. Qingfeng Zhang is leading the newly established Agriculture, Food, Nature, and Rural Sector Office (AFNR) sector office at the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The AFNR sector office spearheads bank-wide efforts for food security, including the ongoing $14 billion food security program (2022–2025), scales up investment in natural capital, promotes integrated river basin management, develops inclusive and green agricultural value chains, and pilots the integration of sovereign operations and private sector investment.

Akmal is a natural resource economist with extensive experience in sustainable development. In his 22-year career at ADB, Akmal has prepared a number of development projects and contributed to country strategies in several countries in the Asia and the Pacific. He has promoted creative project interventions in water resources management, horticulture and dairy value chains, animal disease control, and forest plantations. He has successfully led important policy dialogues with high-level government officials.

Bambang Susantono is the Chairman of the Nusantara National Capital Authority of the Republic of Indonesia since March 2022. The agency, a ministerial-level body directly under the President, is in charge of planning and constructing Indonesia’s new capital, as well as overseeing the government’s transition to the new city and eventually becoming its administrator.

David is currently working at FAO’s Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific in Bangkok.  He specializes in agricultural and food policy analysis, much of it concerned with the Asian and world rice economies. He has spent much of his professional career resident in Southeast Asia, having worked for the Harvard Institute for International Development in Indonesia, the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines and FAO in Thailand, in addition to working several years at FAO headquarters in Rome.  

Takehiko Nakao is the former President of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the Chairperson of ADB’s Board of Directors. He was elected President by ADB’s Board of Governors and assumed office in April 2013.

Ramesh Subramaniam has been with the Asian Development Bank for over 24 years. He has worked in different functions and areas in over 25 countries across the various sub-regions of Asia and the Pacific. As Director General of the Southeast Asia Department (SERD) from July 2017, he is in charge of ADB’s relationship with the 10 countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and Timor Leste, as well as all of its sovereign engagement.