Gothami Chandraratne is a development and humanitarian professional with nearly 20 years of professional experience in the sectors of development, disaster Management and climate change in multiple agencies including semi-government, Red Cross Movement, international and local non-government organizations.Currently, she serves as the Director Operations at Janathakshan (Gte) Ltd heading the Programme Unit of the organization.Janathakshan is a not-for profit organization recognized as a leader in green technologies and promoting sustainable business systems and approaches to contribute to sustainable development.Prior to joining Janathakshan, she worked at Sri Lanka Red Cross Society (SLRCS) for nearly for 11 years completing her career at Sri Lanka Red Cross, 5 year term as the Head of the Disaster Management Department. Her involvement span cross community, national, regional and global level with programme development and implementation, policy development and advocacy initiatives.
Gothami has been actively engaged with civil society networks and national and international partnerships. She is a Regional Advisory Group Member of South Asia region and a member of Task Force on Climate Change of Global Network of Civil Society Organizations for Disaster Reduction (GNDR), and Co-chair of Sri Lanka Preparedness Partnership which is a platform of Government, Private Sector, and Civil Society Organization for preparedness for disaster response, a member of the Disaster Management Policy Committee of Sri Lanka Red Cross Society and a committee member of Association for Disaster Risk Management Professionals of Sri Lanka.
She has been associated with CANSA for 5 years engaged in research studies, knowledge sharing, advocacy initiatives, capacity building as well developing collaborations with local and regional organizations. She held a core chair position of CANSA Sri Lanka from 2018-2020.
Ms.Chandrarantne is equipped with Master’s degree in Organization Management with a Bachelor’s degree in Agriculture from the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka.
Mr. Bashari hold his BS degree in Forestry and Natural Resources from Kabul University in 2009, post-BS in Forestry and Natural Resources from Purdue University, Indiana, USA in 2012 and completed his MS in Natural Resources Policy and Administration from North Carolina State University, USA in 2014.
Mr. Bashari has started his professional career with the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) Afghanistan program in 2008 where he served as the Wildlife Trade Assistant Program Manager, later on promoted to a Conservation Officer. In December 2014, Mr. Bashari completed his MS, upon returning to Afghanistan, he took on the job of Assistant Professor at the Department Forestry and Natural Resources in Kabul University, in order to be able train young conservationists.
As an individual consultant, he worked with the UNFAO and developed a full proposal (project document) for “Community-based Sustainable Land and Forest Management in Afghanistan” project and submitted to the Global Environmental Facility (GEF) and hold USD 11, 000,000 for Afghanistan. Meanwhile, he worked with UNDP and developed a full proposal for Conservation of Snow Leopards and their Critical Ecosystem project and submitted to GEF Secretariat and honored to secure USD 3,000,000 financial support to Afghanistan.
Mr. Bashari currently is the Board Member of the Afghanistan Environmental Experts Association, Assistant Professor at Kabul University, and Policy and Public Relations and GEF Program Manager at the WCS-Afghanistan program. He is also member of CANSA-Afghanistan Steering Committee, member of National Steering Committee and Technical Advisory Group (TAG) of Small Grant Programme (UNDP) and member of Global Youth Biodiversity Network.
With an experience of more two decades in environmental communication, outreach and capacity building, Alka Tomar is president of Centre for Environment Communication (CEC). She is also spearheading Centre for Youth (C4Y). She has worked on climate change, biodiversity, environmental education, water & sanitation and other developmental issues. She has specialisation in climate change communication, environmental research and communication. She has also organised various international and national deliberations and discourses on range of climate change issues across India with policy makers, local governments, climate experts, communication professionals and media.
Her key impact areas are youth engagement, strategies & policy developments, environmental & development projects, capacity building, stakeholders’ management, community engagement outreach & mobilisation, branding, visibility & documentation for social sector, research, impact assessments & programme evaluations, partnership & collaborations.
Ms Tomar also been partnering, networking, collaborating with the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change, Govt of India, Jal Shakti Ministry, state government related departments, research institutions, policy makers, bi-laterals, multi-laterals, environmental organisations, experts, civil societies, research and academic institutions and youth. Alka has undertaken projects on various contemporary issues for IUCN, UNICEF, UNESCO, National Biodiversity Authority, GIZ, Norway Embassy, Tata Trust, PVR Cinemas, Connect4Climate, Plan India, HSBC, YES FOUNDATION, Disney and others.
She has initiated and conducted several trainings and capacity building programmes on communication, SBCC, youth leadership, design thinking, media engagement, education, WASH, biodiversity, research, M&E and on many others focus areas. She initiated series of Behavioural Change Communication (BCC) training Programmes for 1000 Grassroots professionals of various civil society groups, management training programmes for 500 community professional and media for social change trainings for 1500 youth in several urban and rural locations.
Dr Abid Qaiyum Suleri has been heading Sustainable Development Policy Institute, Pakistan’s premier policy research think-tank, since 2007. He is the member of different policy making forums and advisory boards, including Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council; National Advisory Council of Planning commission of Pakistan; Pakistan Climate Change council; National Coordination Committee on Agriculture Transformation; and member of Agricultural Universities Vice Chancellor’s Search Committee, Govt of Punjab.
He is also serving on different international policy making forums, including advisory board of intergovernmental organization CAREC (Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation) Think-Tanks Network; Member of permanent organizing committee of South Asia Economic Summit; Co-Chair of the Board of Climate Action Network South Asia; and lead expert for World Economic Forum’s “Transformation Mapping” initiative from Pakistan. He also served on three judicial commissions (formed by Supreme Court of Pakistan, Islamabad High Court, and Lahore High Court) on environmental issues as well as the Member of Board of Management of Pakistan State Oil (PSO) where he chaired PSO Board’s Audit and Accounts Committee. Dr Suleri represented Pakistan in various official delegations, including UN Sustainable Development Summit; UNFCCC Conference of Parties (COPs); and WTO Ministerial Conferences. His current research interests include Sustainable Development Goals, inclusive and sustainable economy; food security; regional trade; and political economy of development, etc.
He is a regular guest speaker and delivers lectures on different aspects of sustainable development to the career civil servants, officers of armed forces, and parliamentarians. He is an acclaimed writer and besides publishing in academic journals also contributes his policy analysis on sustainable development issues both in print and electronic media. He is also editor-in-chief of SDPI peer reviewed journal, “Journal of Development Policy, Research and Practice”. Dr Suleri earned his PhD in food security from University of Greenwich, United Kingdom.
Dr. Md. Golam Rabbani is head of the Climate Bridge Fund (CBF), BRAC in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Dr. Rabbani has been working on environment and climate change issues at national and regional level for about nineteen years, mainly in the areas of climate risk and vulnerability assessment, risk management, policy and institutional analysis and adaptation to climate change. Dr. Rabbani was of the key team members for preparing Bangladesh’s National Adaptation Programmes of Action (2005), Second National Communication (2012) and Adaptation Chapter for the Third National Communication of Bangladesh. His contribution to research work has been well acknowledged through both national and international publications. His current areas of interest include climate finance, climate change adaptation assessment, adaptation technologies and practices, loss and damages and migration issues. He is also involved in UNFCCC climate negotiation process since 2008.
Golam Rabbani holds a PhD in climate change adaptation from the Department of Environmental Sciences, Jahangirngar University, Dhaka, Bangladesh and a Master of Science and Technology (M.Sc.Tech) in Environmental Science from the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. He also completed B.Sc. (Hons) and M.Sc. (Fisheries) from the Department of Zoology, University of Dhaka, Bangladesh. Before joining Climate Bridge Fund (CBF), BRAC, he held research positions at the Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies (BCAS).
Dr Ngamindra Dahal is serving as Board Member of the CANSA for the years 2021-2023. He is charing the governing Board of Nepal Water Conservation Foundation for Academic Research (nwcf.org.np) , and, serving as the Senior Research Fellow at Southasia Institute of Advanced Studies (SIAS, sias-southasia.org). Dr Dahal is the co-founder of Climate Change Network of Nepal (CCNN, 2003) as the common platform of agencies engaged in Nepal and the Himalayas for launching climate change awareness campaign and on climate change impacts.
In the capacity of climate change policy planner and senior executives, he brings valuable experiences by serving various institutions inlcuding SIAS as the Executive Director, National Trust for Nature Conservation (NTNC), Ministry of Environment of Nepal, ICIMOD, UNDP, ADB and World Bank. He has contributed to build knowledge systems of the Himalaya, South Asia and Nepal specific issues from the perspectives of climate, climate change, disaster risk management and climate friendly technologies including the biochar. He has authored, edited and published scores of research papers, books, and book chapters, policy briefs, technical reports, media articles and conference proceedings. More recently he actively pursuing policy research on climate resilient agriculture and water management issues in the backdrop of climate change and urbanisations in South Asia. He can be accessed at: ngamindra@gmail.com.
Farah Kabir has been working with ActionAid Bangladesh as the Country Director since June 2007. Over close to three decades of vast experience in the field of development and research has made her renowned human rights figure at home and abroad with an uncompromising voice against human-rights violation. For her significant contribution in women’s rights movement of Bangladesh, Farah Kabir won the prestigious “Nawab Ali Chowdhury National Award 2012”. She is the Chair of the Global Board of the Global Network of Disaster Risk Reduction (GNDR) since 2015, a Board Member of Climate Action Network South Asia (CANSA) in 2019, a member of Advisory committee of Bangladesh’s NDA to the Green Climate Fund (GCF).
Ms. Kabir worked with British Council for nearly ten years both in Bangladesh and United Kingdom. She is the co-editor of two recent publications namely ‘Discourse Analysis as a Tool for Understanding Gender Identity, Representation and Equality’ and ‘Revealing Gender Inequalities and Perceptions in South Asian Countries through Discourse Analysis’.
Prabin Man Singh is a Programme Director in Prakriti Resources Centre (PRC) since 2017. PRC is a member organization of Climate Action Network South Asia. He has over two decades of work experience in the field of environment, disaster risk reduction and climate change. He had successfully implemented several programmes and projects in the above fields. He works with civil society networks and alliances nationally and in the South Asia region. He had conducted several research reports on disaster risk reduction, climate finance, climate induced loss and damage and other topics.
He has been associated with CANSA since 2012 in different capacities. He had also served as Coordinator of National Steering Committee of CANSA in Nepal.
Mr. M. Ramesh Babu is the current Executive Director of EFICOR. Mr.Ramesh joined EFICOR in the year 1996 and has been serving since then in various capacities and responsibilities. He did his Masters in Social Work from Andhra University in 1996. Working in the training Department as ‘Training Assistant”, he looked after the trainees’ residential center and facilitated the sessions. In the year 2002 EFICOR seconded him and his family to work in the Koya Tribal Community where he facilitated community transformation. Coming back to Delhi in 2006, he joined the Programmes Department at the Headquarters as Manager for Direct Projects looking after all Direct Programmes, Disaster Response and Recovery. In the year 2012 he took over as the Director of the Programmes Department and expanded the reach to many interior parts of the country. He’s been part of Board of Directors of various organizations and network bodies.
Equipped with a Masters Degree in Social Work with HR specialization, Mr. Ramesh Babu has 25 years of experience with EFICOR, including 7 years in the leadership role as Director (Programs) along with 16 years of experience in implementing development projects and strategic development. His area of expertise includes Community Mobilization and Capacity Building. As a member of Sphere India Executive Body, he has engaged with National and state level administration. Under his leadership as the Director of Programmes, EFICOR has been awarded for three times over the last 6 years by Project Management India (PMI) for the efficient and dedicated work for the marginalized communities. He has been part of CAN SA since 2008 and has served as NSC member for the last 4 years. He has also attended the UN COP gatherings.
Being an environmental professional with academic background – Masters in Plant Ecology, he has more than 30 years of experience working for environmental conservation including protected area management, botanical surveys, social ecology, forest restoration, livelihood development and community based biodiversity conservation. Worked with the SriLanka Government, International organizations, NGOs and private sector. Presently, he is the secretary of civil society organization CABRE (Center for Applied Biodiversity Research and Education) – a partner organization of CANSA. Engagements with CANSA during last 7 years, enabled him promoting initiatives to climate change actions with government, NGOs and community groups. Particular focus included; develop, or contribute to educational or outreach programs on the environment or climate change, review existing policies to identify environmental impacts and provide analytical support for technical briefs related to biodiversity and climate change. Concurrently, he serves as a consultant plant ecologist of IUCN – The World Conservation Union, Sri Lanka and member of species expert committee of Ministry of Environment, Sri Lanka. His professional inputs have benefited biodiversity surveys in many parts of the country, conserving protected areas and preparation of nationally important documents like IUCN REDLIST and conservation guides. He has authored more than 50 technical publications including several books related to Sri Lankan plants and biodiversity conservation.