Plenary: The Way Forward

Plenary Description

The sustainability governance landscape has become more complex. There is now a multitude of actors and a great variety ways of shaping or contributing to the global sustainable development
agenda. Let us use this openness to bring our messages from the Global Soil Week foreword. Which partnerships do we need to strengthen, which topics require more attention and what are we going to do about them? During the concluding Way Forward Plenary we invite panelists and participants to share their view on questions such as these and do discuss the next steps emerging from the Global Soil Week 2015.

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Thomas Silberhorn
Parliamentary State Secretary, BMZ – Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (Germany)

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Mette Løyche Wilkie
Director, Division of Environmental Policy Implementation (DEPI),
UNEP – United Nations Environment Programme (Kenya)

Mette Løyche Wilkie has a background in forestry and environmental management and more than 25 years of experience in providing technical and policy advice to developing countries, partner organisations and international conventions on sustainable forestry, environmental management and rural development issues. She began her career in Africa and Asia, where she worked for more than ten years before joining the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations at their HQ in Rome, where she worked for 16 years prior to taking up the position with UNEP in June 2014. Mette Løyche Wilkie’s current portfolio covers a broad range of topics related to the conservation and management of terrestrial and marine ecosystems and their biodiversity; climate change adaptation; the environmental aspects of conflicts and disasters; poverty and the environment; and environmental education.

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Maria Krautzberger
President, UBA – Umweltbundesamt/Federal Environment Agency (Germany)

Maria Krautzberger has been the head of the German Federal Environmental Agency (UBA) since 2014. Before joining UBA, she served as Permanent State Secretary for Urban Development and the Environment at the Berlin Senate. Prior to that, she was Senator for the Environment of the Free Hanseatic City of Luebeck. Maria Krautzberger has launched numerous environmental policy initiatives, such as the “Stadtentwicklungsplan Klima Berlin” – a climate-related urban development plan for Berlin; certification of forests; and played a key role in establishing Germany’s first low-emission, environmental zone in Berlin. She holds a Master´s degree in administrative science from Constance University and studied sociology at the University of Munich.

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Ursula Schaefer-Preuss
Chair of Global Water Partnership (Sweden)

Dr. Schaefer-Preuss is an economist who has been engaged in the field of development policy for more than 35 years. Her latest assignment before assuming the responsibility as Chair of Global Water Partnership was as Vice President of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) for Knowledge Management and Sustainable Development. Prior to joining ADB, Dr. Schaefer-Preuss was Director General of Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). She has also held senior posts in the Inter-American Development Bank and the German Permanent Mission to the UN.
She has always been active in issues related to human development, women’s empowerment, and support of civil society, focusing on vulnerable groups, children’s rights, and challenges for the young generation in a fast changing global environment.
Dr. Schaefer-Preuss became Chair of the Global Water Partnership (Stockholm, Sweden) in January 2013.

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Hubert Ouédraogo
Lead Land Expert, Land Policy Initiative, UNECA – United Nations
Economic Commission for Africa (Ethiopia)

 

 

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Gerda Verburg
Chair, UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS) (Italy)

 

 

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Alexander Müller
Secretary General ad interim, IASS – Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (Germany)

Before joining the IASS, Alexander Müller served as Assistant Director General of the FAO and was responsible for the Department for Natural Resources and Environment. From 2008 to 2011 he was chair of the United Nations System Standing Committee on Nutrition (UNSCN).