Speakers

Paolo Magri is the Executive Vice President of the Italian Institute for International Political Studies (ISPI) and Professor of International Relations at Bocconi University. He is a member of the Strategic Committee of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, of the Europe Policy Group of the World Economic Forum (Davos) and of the Board of Directors of the Italy-China Foundation. He is also a member of the Scientific Committees of the Elcano Royal Institute, the Center of Excellence for Stability Police Units (CoESPU) and of the Military Center for Strategic Studies (Ce.Mi.S.S.). He is a regular speaker, writer, and commentator to various media outlets on global issues, US foreign policy, Iran, and Middle East. Previously, he served as Programme Director to the UN Secretariat in New York and, up to 2005, as Director of International Affairs at Bocconi University in Milan.

Domenico Fumagalli, Senior Partner of the KPMG Network in Italy, is also a member of the Global Board of KPMG, the international body that defines the global KPMG strategic guidelines, and of the EMA Board, which coordinates the activities of KPMG in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Over the course of his professional career, Domenico’s particular area of specialization has been Financial Services, a sector in which he has managed important audit engagements and also important strategic/financial/organizational projects for leading Italian and international banking groups, including Intesa Sanpaolo, UniCredit, Credit Suisse, Unione di Banche Italiane and Citigroup.

As coordinator of the Italian KPMG Network, Domenico has promoted important Thought Leadership initiatives, including the M&A Academy, in collaboration with Borsa Italiana and SDA Bocconi, and, recently, The Frame – Human Innovation, an event organized in collaboration with Il Corriere della Sera, to encourage Italian enterprises to explore and adopt new ways of managing innovation.

Appointed Minister on 13 February 2021. Economist, statistician and academic. Full professor (on leave) of economic statistics at the University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, where he taught Statistics and Analysis and Policies for Sustainable Development.

Chief Statistician of the OECD from 2001 to August 2009. President of ISTAT from August 2009 to April 2013. Minister of Labour and Social Policies from 2013 to 2014.

He is the co-founder of the Italian Alliance for Sustainable Development (ASviS), a network of more than 290 subjects of Italian civil society, of which he was spokeperson until 13 February 2021.

Until January 2021 he was President of the European Statistical Governance Advisory Board, member of the Executive Board of the Club of Rome, of the Global Happiness Council, Chairman of the Committee for the Report on the Economy Not Observed and Tax Evasion of the Ministry of Economy and Finance and member of the Scientific Committee of the Parliamentary Budget Office.

From May 2020 he is responsible for the Futura Network project.

Jeffrey D. Sachs is a world-renowned professor of economics, leader in sustainable development, senior UN advisor, bestselling author, and syndicated columnist whose monthly newspaper columns appear in more than 100 countries. He is the co-recipient of the 2015 Blue Planet Prize, the leading global prize for environmental leadership, and has twice been named among Time Magazine’s 100 most influential world leaders.

Professor Sachs served as the Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University from 2002 to 2016. He was appointed University Professor at Columbia University in 2016 and also serves as Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development and Professor of Health Policy and Management. He is Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on the Sustainable Development Goals, and previously advised both Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Secretary-General Kofi Annan on the Millennium Development Goals. 

Joyeeta Gupta is professor of environment and development at the University of Amsterdam and IHE Delft Institute for Water Education. She is co-chair of UNEP’s Global Environment Outlook-6 (2016-2019) and of Future Earth’s Earth Commission (2019-2021). She has just won the European Research Council’s Advanced Grant for 2021-2026).

Stéphane Hallegatte is a lead economist with the Climate Change Group of the World Bank. He joined the World Bank in 2012 after 10 years of academic research in environmental economics and climate science for Météo-France, the Centre International de Recherche sur l’Environnement et le Développement, and Stanford University.

Mr. Hallegatte was a lead author of the 5th Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). He is the author of dozens of articles published in international journals in multiple disciplines and of several books.

He was the team leader for the World Bank Group Climate Change Action Plan, a large internal coordination exercise to determine and explain how the Group will support countries in their implementation of the Paris Agreement.

Richard Kinley was a senior official at the UN Climate Change Secretariat (UNFCCC) from 1993 to 2017. He served as Deputy Executive Secretary from 2006 to 2017 and was intimately involved in the development of UNFCCC as an organization from its establishment and in its management and operations. He also led or oversaw the secretariat’s support to the climate change negotiations, including the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement, and to the intergovernmental institutions.

Prior to joining UNFCCC, Richard was an official of the Government of Canada working on international environmental policy issues.

He holds a B.A. in political studies and an M.A. in international relations.

Mr. Maximo Torero Cullen is the Chief Economist of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). He joined the Organization in January 2019 as Assistant Director-General for the Economic and Social Development Department.

Prior to joining FAO, he was the World Bank Group Executive Director for Argentina, Bolivia, Chile Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay since November 2016 and before the Bank Mr. Torero led the Division of the Markets, Trade, and Institutions at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).

His major research work lies mostly in analyzing poverty, inequality, importance of geography and assets (private or public) in explaining poverty, and in policies oriented towards poverty alleviation based on the role played by infrastructure, institutions, and on how technological breakthroughs (or discontinuities) can improve the welfare of households and small farmers. His experience encompasses Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Asia.

Gernot Laganda is leading the Climate and Disaster Risk Reduction Programs at the United Nations’ World Food Program (WFP). He supports WFP Country Offices and the governments they serve to understand the effects of climate change on food security, develop measures to reduce climate risks in food systems, and make climate risk financing work for vulnerable communities.

Gernot joined WFP from the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), where he managed the world’s largest climate change adaptation program for smallholder farmers.

A geoscientist by training, he spent the past 20 years working at the nexus between disaster management and sustainable development – holding posts with NGOs supporting disaster relief projects in Afghanistan and Tajikistan; serving as Humanitarian Program Specialist with the Austrian Development Agency; and managing climate and environmental programs with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in South Africa and the Asia/Pacific region.

Gernot is a Greenberg World Fellow at Yale University and a guest lecturer at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zuerich.

David Nabarro is the Co-Director of the Imperial College Institute of Global Health Innovation and supports systems leadership for sustainable development through his Switzerland based social enterprise 4SD (Skills, Systems and Synergies for Sustainable Development).

Currently David is Special Envoy of WHO on COVID-19 and Senior Advisor to the United Nations Food Systems Summit.

David secured his medical qualification in 1974 and has worked in over 50 countries in multiple positions.

In October 2018, David received the World Food Prize together with Lawrence Haddad for their leadership in building coalitions for action for better nutrition across the Sustainable Development Goals.

María José Sanz Sánchez  is Scientific Director of the Basque Centre for Climate Change (BC3), Ikerbasque Professor, Chair of the Advisory Group of the MDG of the Global Forest Observation Inititative (GFOI) and co-Chair of the Transdisciplinary Advisory Board of the EU Joint Programe Inititative (JPI) on Climate.

She is also Advisor of the Spanish Ministry of Ecological Transition on the Economic impacts assesement of the 2030 Integrate Energy and Climate Change Plan and the 2050 Climate Change LTS.

She has been  Coordinator of the UNREDD Programme at the Forestry Department in FAO, Scientific Director of the Research Institute on Climate Change Zaragoza (I2C2), Senior Programme Officer at UNFCCC Secretariat. In 2007 she represented EU sitting on the UNFCCC CDM Executive Board.

As contributor of IPCC, she got the Noble Prize for Peace in 2007.

Johan Swinnen became director general of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) in January 2020.

He is a Commissioner in the Food Systems Economics Commission; Co-Chair of the Think20 (T20) Task Force on Climate Change, Sustainable Energy, and Environment; and also a member of the Champions 12.3 Leadership Group to Reduce Food Loss and Waste (SDG Target 12.3) and of the Africa Europe Strategic Task Force on Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems.

Prior to joining IFPRI, Dr. Swinnen was professor of economics and director of the LICOS Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance at KU Leuven (Belgium) and senior research fellow at the Centre for European Policy Studies in Brussels.

Inger Andersen is Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme.

Between 2015 and 2019, Ms. Andersen was the Director General of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).  Ms. Andersen has more than 30 years of experience in international development economics, environmental sustainability, strategy and operations and has held senior positions at the World Bank and the United Nations.

Mr. Francesco La Camera is the Director-General of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA). He has more than thirty years of experience in the fields of climate, sustainability, and international cooperation. He formerly served as Director-General of Sustainable Development, Environmental Damage, EU and International Affairs at the Italian Ministry of Environment, Land & Sea. He played a key role in bringing together multilateral organisations to develop joint initiatives designed to implement the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals. Author of many publications, Mr. La Camera was a Lecturer of Sustainable Development at the University of Cosenza and of Environment & Land Economics at the University of Roma 3. He began his career as an economic analyst at the Italian Ministry of Budget and Planning.

Born in Varese in 1962, after graduating in Civil Hydraulic Engineering at the Milan Polytechnic in 1989, he worked from 1989 to 1995 at Snam holding various positions in the development division of foreign activities. From 1990 to 1993 he worked in Argentina as Area Manager for South America.
From 1996 to 1998 he was Regional Manager for Southeast Asia, based in Indonesia and Thailand, for Ansaldo Energia.
In 1999 he was Key Account Manager in the international management of Pirelli Cavi e Sistemi.
He joined EDISON in 2000 as head of international development.
In 2007 he moved to the Exploration & Production (E&P) Division as Deputy Director. In 2012 he assumed the position of head of the E&P Division and joined the Executive Committee of EDISON. In 2017 he also assumed the position of Executive Vice President of the Power Asset and Engineering Division of EDISON.
In 2020 Nicola Monti led the company in the transition from the Oil & Gas business, restructuring the company’s portfolio in line with the sustainable challenges of the energy sector and setting an ambitious goal of more than doubling renewable installed capacity by 2030. He in addition, the company strategy focused on the centrality of the customer, confirming Edison’s recognized leadership in terms of high quality of service, transparency and ethics.
In 2021 he strengthened ESG governance with a renewed commitment to the objectives of the United Nations Agenda and promoted the establishment of EOS Orizzonti Sociali, a Foundation entirely dedicated to social issues of which he is President. He also chairs the Edison Foundation, one of the most influential economic research centers in Italy, and is a member of various national and international associations, including local trade associations.

Mike has been involved in the global renewables business for the past 20 years and over the last 8 years he has also been focusing on climate change and decarbonisation for clients around the world. He leads KPMG’s climate change and decarbonization business which includes the provision of services such as climate risk management, net zero pathways, corporate PPAs, carbon accounting, and green finance.

Mike advises numerous international asset managers, developers, corporates and utilities. In addition, Mike is passionately committed to sustainable energy and climate innovation and leads a KPMG team collaborating with the World Economic Forum on this agenda.

As part of this work Mike and the Forum have worked on some unique propositions on innovation financing.

Ecolawyer primarily assisting public administration, environmental associations and citizens’ committees.

Paola Brambilla is the Coordinator of EIA, the Commission for Environmental Impact Assessment, at the Italian Ministry for Ecological Transition. Formerly Delegate of WWF Italy for Lombardy, at present she coordinates the National Legal Committee.

She serves as a Member of the Executive Committee of Rivista giuridica per l’Ambiente and of the Ethics Committee of ISZLER, focusing on ethics in research. She is Adjunct Professor of EU Law at the University of Bergamo and has authored numerous publications on EU and Environmental Law.

Since 2019 Paola Brambilla is a Member of the Steering Committee of Fondazione Cariplo.

Amar Bhattacharya is a senior fellow in the Center for Sustainable Development, housed in the Global Economy and Development program at Brookings. His focus areas are the global economy, development finance, global governance, and the links between climate and development.

From April 2007 until September 2014 he was Director of the Group of 24, an intergovernmental group of developing country Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors. In that capacity he led the work program of the Group, supported the deliberations of the Ministers, and was the principal point of interface with other organizations including the G20.

Prior to taking up his position with the G24, Mr. Bhattacharya had a long-standing career in the World Bank.  His last position was as Senior Advisor and Head of the International Policy and Partnership Group.

Luiz de Mello is Director of the Policy Studies Branch in the Economics Department of the OECD. Together with the policy studies teams, Mr. de Mello provides leadership and strategic direction within the economics department, ensuring the design and implementation of analysis and policies which promote stronger, cleaner, fairer and more inclusive economic growth for member and partner countries. Structural policy surveillance, short and long term economic outlooks, public finance and macroeconomic policy analysis are among the key workstreams for policy studies.

Earlier in his career, Mr. de Mello held senior positions at the OECD, including Deputy-Director of the Public Governance Directorate and Chief of Staff and Counsellor to the Chief Economist. Prior to joining the OECD, he worked as a Senior Economist at the Fiscal Affairs Department of the International Monetary Fund, and as a Lecturer at the Economics Department of the University of Kent, United Kingdom. He holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Kent, United Kingdom.