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Ngonidzashe Chirinda

Professor of Sustainable Tropical Agriculture, Mohammed VI Polytechnic University

Ngonidzashe (Ngoni) Chirinda’s work focuses on how innovation in agriculture can solve climate-related problems for farmers and nations around the world. He explores new ideas for solving climate and food security problems, and his work informs national and international climate mitigation processes. He was also a lead author of the 2019 Refinement of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories 2006, where he focused on updating the guidelines based on new scientific findings. He was a coordinating lead author of Chapter 3 (Developing ‘the Africa we want’: achieving Agenda 2063 that also improves air quality and addresses climate change) on the Integrated Assessment of Air Pollution and Climate Change for Sustainable Development in Africa. Ngoni is a climate change mitigation panel member on the Scientific and Technical Advisory Panel of the Global Environment Facility. He is a co-lead of the Global Research Alliance’s Network to Support Inventories and Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) and a member of the Agriculture Technical Working Group of the Climate Bond Initiatives. He is also a member of the United Kingdom Research and Innovation International Development Peer Review College and a member of the editorial board of Nature Scientific Report and Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems. Ngoni has a scientific background in soil science and agroecology and did post-doctoral research on spatial and temporal carbon dynamics in cultivated landscapes at the University of Aarhus, Denmark.

Mario Herrero

Professor, Nancy and Peter Meinig Family Investigator in the Life Sciences, Department of Global Development; Director, Food Systems & Global Change; Cornell Atkinson Scholar

Mario Herrero is a professor in the Cornell CALS Department of Global Development, the director of Food Systems & Global Change, a Cornell Atkinson Scholar, and a Nancy and Peter Meinig Family Investigator in the Life Sciences. His research focuses on increasing the sustainability of food systems for the benefit of humans and ecosystems. He works in the areas of food systems and the environment, climate mitigation and adaptation, livestock systems, true cost of food, sustainability metrics, and healthy and sustainable diets. He has played senior roles in many global initiatives on food and the environment (IPCC, UN Food Systems Summit, AgMip, etc). He is currently a Coordinating Lead Author of the forthcoming IPBES-Nexus Report and a Commissioner and Executive Committee member of the EAT-Lancet 2.0 study. Mario is a highly-cited researcher according to the Web of Science, and is in the top 10 of Reuters list of most influential climate change scientists. He obtained his postgraduate degrees from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.

Mark Howden

Director of the Institute for Climate, Energy and Disaster Solutions, The Australian National University

In addition to his Professorship at the ANU, Mark Howden is also an Honorary Professor at Melbourne University, a Vice Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and is the Chair of the ACT Climate Change Council. He was on the US Federal Advisory Committee for the 3rd National Climate Assessment, was a member of the Australian National Climate Science Advisory Committee and contributes to several major national and international science and policy advisory bodies.

Mark has worked on climate variability, climate change, innovation and adoption issues for over 30 years in partnership with many industry, community and policy groups via both research and science-policy roles. Issues he has addressed include agriculture and food security, the natural resource base, ecosystems and biodiversity, energy, water and urban systems.

Mark has over 420 publications of different types. He helped develop both the national and international greenhouse gas inventories that are a fundamental part of the Paris Agreement and has assessed sustainable ways to reduce emissions. He has been a major contributor to the IPCC since 1991, with roles in the Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth and now Sixth Assessment Reports, sharing the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with other IPCC participants and Al Gore.

Andy Reisinger

Honorary Associate Professor, Australian National University and Independent Consultant

Andy Reisinger brings an internationally recognised scientific profile in climate change. Andy is a member of the Bureau of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and vice-chair of Working Group III (Mitigation), and played a key role in the successful approval of the IPCC’s 6th Assessment Report on mitigation. He also served as coordinating lead author in two major IPCC climate change reports released in 2014. Andy is also serving as Commissioner for He Pou a Rangi, the New Zealand Climate Change Commission, which provides evidence-based advice to guide climate change action for Aotearoa. This includes advice to the Government on emission budgets and targets and related policies, as well as undertaking regular national climate change risk assessments. The Commission also monitors the Government’s response to climate change through its Emission Reduction and National Adaptation Plans.

Prior to this role, Andy was Principal Scientist for climate change at the Ministry for the Environment, and Deputy Director (International) of the New Zealand Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Research Centre, a fully-government funded Centre working in partnership with industry to develop and extend ways of reducing New Zealand’s and global agricultural greenhouse gas emissions.

Andy’s personal research interests focus on the role of agriculture in domestic and international climate change policy, greenhouse emission metrics, adaptation strategies, and ways of managing uncertainty in decision-making for mitigation and adaptation.

Theun Vellinga

Senior researcher in livestock and environment, Wageningen University and Research Centre

Theun Vellinga has 30 years of experience in agricultural research, ranging from grassland management, grazing, environmental impacts, modelling farming systems, life cycle assessments, feed chain analysis and manure management. He is experienced in cooperation with policy workers, farmers and industry and is skilled in developing solutions to apply developed knowledge in practical tools for stakeholders.

Claudia Arndt

Senior Scientist and Team Leader at the Mazingira Centre, housed within the International Livestock Research Institute in Nairobi – East Africa’s premier measurement hub for greenhouse gas emissions and nutrient flows.

The Centre’s primary mission is to understand and mitigate the environmental impacts of livestock systems.

Claudia formally served as an Associate Scientist at the National Agrarian University La Molina in Peru and carried out post doc research at the Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center in Costa Rica. Earlier in her career, she also contributed her skills and knowledge to the Environmental Defense Fund, an prominent nonprofit environmental advocacy group in the US.

Claudia’s academic background includes a PhD in Dairy Science from the University of Wisconsin in the US, and an MSc in Livestock Sciences and a BSc in Agricultural Sciences and Environmental Management from the Justus Liebig University of Giessen in Germany.

Claudia’s research focuses on the mitigation of methane enteric emissions from livestock, improvement of national greenhouse gas inventories, and the optimisation of nutrient utilisation efficiency with the aim of reducing the environmental impact of livestock systems and promoting the sustainable use of natural resources.