Taichi Minamitani

Mr. Minamitani Taichi sis the Director of the Disaster Risk Reduction Division 1, Global Environment Department, Japany International Cooperation Agency (JICA). He joined JICA in 2007. His division is in charge of JICA's flood and landslide projects globally. This includes JICA's operations for the 2022 Pakistan flood. He holds a Master’s degrees from Kyoto University, Japan, and King’s College London, UK, and is currently a PhD candidate.
 

Harshita Rathi

Harshita Rathi is a Project Manager at Dalberg Advisor’s Mumbai office. Her work spans gender, education, employment, water and sanitation, anti-trafficking, and humanitarian assistance sectors. She led the ADB engagement with Dalberg which looked at how private financing can be catalyzed for water and sanitation in India through financial and non-financial instruments. Among her other water and sanitation engagements are working with a global charity to segment the water and sanitation value chains and mapping challenges financers face in serving small business operators.

Avni Kumar

Avni Kumar specialises in water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), with a cross-cutting focus on gender equality and social inclusion (GESI) and climate resilience in WASH. She has a background in development economics and has worked in various capacities with government, civil society, private sector and multilateral organisations. Avni has been a part of several projects related to women in the WASH workforce as well as promoting equality and inclusion in WASH programs.

James Young

James Young led the utility in delivering key services to customers on South Tarawa and promote a culture of learning, safety, and excellence within the utility. He also led the utility in a performance improvement process resulting in a more efficient, safer utility where staff is qualified, supported by training, and empowered in their career pathway within the organization.

Asset Management: Condition and Performance

The speakers set the scene with an overview of the discipline of asset management. He highlighted the importance of asset managers knowing their assets as the foundation for the implementation of sound asset management. He also emphasized the importance of good data management as an essential feature of an asset management system. The use of tools such as spreadsheets was highlighted as an effective and low-cost way for utilities to organize and analyze their data.