Climate Change and Natural Resource Governance
3:45 – 5 PM
Location: Al Mirqab Ballroom, Four Seasons Hotel Doha
Afghanistan presently faces its most severe drought in 27 years, a crisis further compounded by the impacts of COVID-19 and the economic downturn following the Taliban’s assumption of government control in August 2021. These combined challenges have led to a significant escalation in livelihood insecurity and food scarcity, giving rise to an expanding humanitarian crisis. The looming specter of climate change adds to the woes of those dependent on agriculture, exacerbating food insecurity. In conjunction with ongoing conflict and the consequences of climate change, this dire situation has spurred internal displacement and altered migration patterns within Afghanistan. Our panel aims to conduct a thorough examination of the prevailing conditions on the ground in the country, shedding light on the primary factors and complexities intertwined with the critical issues of food security and climate change in Afghanistan.
M. Reza Pirbhai (Chair)
M. Reza Pirbhai is an Associate Professor, specializing in South Asian and World history. His research is focused on Islam in Modern South Asia. He earned a doctorate in History from the University of Toronto (Canada) in 2004. Before joining the faculty at Georgetown he was Assistant Professor at the University of Manitoba (Canada) and Associate Professor at Louisiana State University (USA). His articles/book chapters on such topics as Islamic law and theology, Hindu nationalism and British travel literature have appeared in the Journal of Asian History, Modern Intellectual History and South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, Hawwa and the Oxford Handbook of Islamic Law. He is also the author of the books ‘Reconsidering Islam in a South Asian Context,’ published by E.J. Brill (2009), and ‘Fatima Jinnah: Mother of the Nation,’ published by Cambridge University Press (2017).
Ambassador Androulla Kaminara
Ambassador Androulla Kaminara served as the Ambassador and Head of the Delegation of the European Union to the Islamic Republic of Pakistan from 2019 to 2022. She is also an Associate Editor of the “The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers’ (IEEE) Transactions on Technology and Society Journal. During more than two decades with the European Commission and European External Action Service, she served as Principal Adviser and Head of the Task Force “Knowledge, Performance and Results” in the Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development – EuropeAid. She also held the position of Director of Operations covering Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the Pacific in the Directorate-General for European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO). Earlier in her career, she was Head of the European Commission Representation in Cyprus, and a Director for Quality of Operations in EuropeAid overseeing the quality of development cooperation operations of the EU to third countries.
Mohammad Assem Mayar
Mohammad Assem Mayar is an Afghan scientist researching water resources management, climate change, floods, droughts, and food security in Afghanistan. Dr. Mayar previously served as a lecturer at Kabul Polytechnic University and is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF) in Müncheberg, Germany. Dr. Mayar has several publications, including detailed policy and strategy analyses of tackling climate change and drought risk mitigation in Afghanistan.
Matt Reed
Matt Reed is the Global Director of Institutional Partnerships for the Aga Khan Foundation, responsible for coordinating AKF’s strategic partnerships with bilateral, multilateral, foundation, and corporate partners worldwide. He has been CEO of AKF in the UK since 2016. Dr. Reed has worked with the Aga Khan Development Network since 2009, serving as Director of Programmes at AKF (UK) in London and CEO of AKF (India) in Delhi. Previously, he worked at the Getty Research Institute, the Salzburg Seminar, the MacArthur Foundation, and Keck Graduate Institute at the Claremont Colleges.