Dr. Jennifer Lenhart

Jennifer Lenhart, WWF Sweden, is Global Lead for WWF Cities, which has engaged circa 500 cities in 50 countries. She holds a PhD in urban climate governance from Wageningen University (the Netherlands) and has 15 years’ experience addressing urban environmental challenges via holistic approaches. Her fascination with urban planning and design, including how people interact in and with cities, inspired her blog, the Urban Observer, which chronicled her bicycle lifestyle (then in Amsterdam). This was recognized by Guardian Cities as one of the best city blogs. She previously worked at UN-Habitat’s Urban Environment Planning Branch in Nairobi, Kenya; the City of Malmö Environment Department, Sweden; and an urban sustainability consultancy in Seattle, USA. She currently parks her bicycle in Santiago de Chile, her new home for over a year.

Dr. Antonio Zumelzu

Doctor (Ph.D) in Sustainable Planning from the Technological University of Eindhoven, Holland (2015) and Architect by the Austral University of Chile (2008). He is an academic at the Institute of Architecture and Urbanism, of the Faculty of Architecture and Arts, Austral University of Chile and visiting professor of the Doctorate in Architecture and Urbanism of the University of Bio-Bío. He is a researcher in charge of the Observatory of Sustainability and Urban Studies of the South Austral (OBSUR) (2018). He is a member of the. Chilean National Accreditation Commission (CNA Chile), of the Ibero-American Research Network on Public Policies, Conflicts and Movements of the Ibero-American Postgraduate University Association (AUIP), of the Academic Network of Urban Design (READU Chile), and Docomomo Chile.

His research has been aimed at exploring various sustainability criteria for the construction of new methodologies and tools for assessing the built environment of intermediate cities in southern Chile.

Dr. Felix Fuders

Dr. Felix Fuders is a professor of economics in pre-and postgraduate courses at Universidad Austral de Chile. He is the author and co-author of a series of publications on the issue of regional currencies as a solution to a global (financial) crisis and on sustainable development, including the book ” Sustainable Evolution II – Notes for a reasonable exit “, prepared in cooperation with researchers from the Mondragón University ) and Manfred Max-Neef. His research interests are Ecological Economics,Ecosystem Services,European Central Bank,Finance,Financial Analysis,Financial Economics,Financial, Economics and Philosophy,Global Studies,Human Development Theory,Human Scale Development,Local money,Sustainability

Moritz Kasper

With interest in heterogeneous, socio-technical realities of the urban everyday, I am currently working as a doctoral researcher and lecturer at the department of International Planning Studies of the School of Spatial Planning at TU Dortmund. Over the past 10 years, I have engaged in projects, in-depth research, and research-design-transfers with and for international organizations, big and small NGOs, governmental entities, and many others in Europe and Africa. As an urban scholar and geographer at heart, I have a knack for engaging in qualitative to experimental to artistic research on everything urban, especially but not only in the so-called Global South. From such research, I aspire to ideate, discuss, and advance on spatially active interventions that may help to make things better.

Rowena T. Zapanta

ROWENA T. ZAPANTA, is the City Planning and Development Coordinator of the Local Government of Antipolo, Philippines. She has been in a Public Service for nineteen (19) years, focusing on development planning, investment programming, community organization, institutional capacities, housing and basic utilities, among others. Having worked in the LGU, she is both a witness and an active public servant in the delivery of equitable public services in the grassroots level. In the time of pandemic, she has been a frontliner specifically in the implementation of the Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ), the institutional capacity of the LGU was stretched to the fullest, having a limited number of manpower and resources in light of a big demand from the community, the need to cover a vast geographical area for a large population in the fastest time possible, not to mention the fear of the virus that envelops every frontliners’ mind.

Vinson Serrano

Vinson is a registered and licensed architect and alumnus of the SPRING Programme – Universidad Austral de Chile in Valdivia. He currently serves as the College Secretary of the University of Santo Tomas College of Architecture and is a research associate of the Research Center for Culture, Arts and Humanities. He has published within the realms of architecture and urbanism, climate change adaptation and disaster resiliency, and nature and community-based ecotourism.

Vinson is also green building professional and a fellow of the Brown International Advanced Research Institutes (BIARI) in 2018. He won a research seed grant for the research proposal: “Effectiveness of Wireless Mesh Network as an Alternative Form of Communication in the Community During Disaster”. His involved projects include consultancy works for various organizations in the Philippines focusing on climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction programs.

Frans Beckers

Frans Beckers, based in the Netherlands, more than 20 years working on a transition towards a circular economy. Background in logistics, waste management and recycling. Creating circular business models, from strategy to practice, supported by IT-platforms. Brought together in the companies FBBasic and Cirmar. Step by step, thinking in transitions, driven by necessary economics, raw materials availability, at the same time improving the natural environment. First focus at Europe, but inviting everybody to join.

Maija Kale

As a values’ driven individual, Maija finds it of utmost importance that sustainability is not only a theoretical concept but is also reflected in our everyday dilemmas and choices. Having a degree in business and a background in international development, she has always worked in that dynamic and challenging space between the public, the corporate and the civic sectors. Since 2016 Maija Kale has been working as an Advisor for Sustainability and Digitalization at the Nordic Council of Ministers’ Office in Latvia. Her areas of responsibility include such topics as smart cities, energy security, 5G cooperation, food value chains, bioeconomy and circular economy, and gender balance in tech and energy sectors.

Prof Einhard Schmidt-Kallert

Professor emeritus Einhard Schmidt-Kallert (born in 1949) has a track record of spatial planning experience both in development consultancy and in the academic sphere. As a consultant he was the responsible project director of numerous feasibility studies and implementation projects in the fields of regional development planning, urban management and natural resources management. He has worked in a number of African and Asian countries, but also in the transition countries of Eastern Europe and Central Asia. From 2005 to his retirement in 2014 he was the Head of the Department of Spatial Planning in Developing Countries at TU Dortmund University in Germany. Over the last few years, he held teaching assignments at University of Duhok (Iraq), the Institute of rural Development

Planning in Dodoma (Tanzania), the University of the Philippines in Manila, and University Duisburg- Essen (Germany). For many years he has advocated an approach to the study of urbanization and mega-urbanisation which takes due account of the multi-faceted linkages between city and countryside at all levels. He has published widely in scholarly journals and in magazines and newspapers, and has published and edited a number of books.

Dr Genet Alem

Dr. Daniel Lühr Sierra

Dr. Daniel Vicente Lühr Sierra is Assistant Professor of the Institute of Electricity and Electronics at the Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia, Chile. He received the Lic. Sci degree in Electrical Engineering in 2003, the Dipl. in Electrical Engineering in 2004 and the Dr. degree in 2018, all of them from Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile. From 2004 to 2006, he was Research Associate and No-Fee Consultant to the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics’ Submilimetter Receiver Lab, MA, USA. In 2007 he joined the Universidad Austral de Chile. In 2009 he was one of the founders of the engineering and technological innovation company Triángulo Austral, Ltda. His current research interests are in robotics and astro-engineering. He is a member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) and several IEEE technical societies, including the Education Society, the Computational Intelligence Society, the Society on Social Implications of Technology, the Systems, Man, and Cybernetics Society, as well as the IEEE Special Interest Group in Humanitarian Technology. He is also the technical advisor of Ciudad Limpia, a Smart City project on Intelligent Information System for Residential Waste Collection in the city of Valdivia.

Leo Mutisya

Mutisya is a governance and democracy enthusiast who firmly believes in the rule of good law. He has worked in the governance and public policy sector for more than 10 years. During that period, he has trained and acquired tremendous skills in research and data management, civic engagements and public participation as vital tenets of good governance, interest intermediation, constitution making, organisational capacity development, grant management, monitoring and evaluation and the policy cycle. Most recently, Mutisya is involved in media development research and training. This endeavour has seen him conduct research and train in various fields viz media information and literacy and media viability in Kenya. He is currently the Manager, stakeholder engagements and professional ethics involved in promoting media standards and professionalism in Kenya through promotion of partnerships, strong funding base and strong networks. He also heads the Media and Information Literacy (MIL) program, at the Media Council of Kenya.

Julio Estrada, M.Sc.

Julio Estrada is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Education Sciences at the University of Vechta. He is an architect who graduated in Guatemala in 2004 and achieved a Master of Science degree in urban and regional development planning and management at the SPRING program held in Germany and Tanzania between 2006 and 2008.

Julio started his professional career as a supervisor of water and sanitation infrastructure projects in rural areas of Guatemala. He has worked as urban and regional development planning consultant with different international development agencies where he participated in the formulation of the long-term national development plan of Guatemala, the coordination of regional development plans and the methodologies for local land use planning processes. Then, he has worked as a public servant in the National Planning Secretariat of Guatemala, being in charge of the national land use planning office and responsible for the coordination of the Sustainable Development Goals implementation strategy as well as methodologies and toolkits for the monitoring and evaluation of local government interventions. He has also taught in different universities of Guatemala at the bachelor and master’s degree level. Julio is currently working as urban and regional planning consultant for the 2030 Agenda project of GIZ-Guatemala.

Dr. Clifford Amoako

Clifford Amoako (PhD) is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Planning, KNUST – Kumasi, Ghana. He is a development planner and an interdisciplinary scholar who deploys multiple theoretical and methodological lenses to interrogate issues related to urban and regional development in the Global south. His current research interests are in urban vulnerability and responses to natural hazards; transportation planning and artisanal small-scale mining in developing countries.

Ar. Rodolfo P. Ventura

Ar. Ventura is the current Dean of the UST College of Architecture in Manila, Philippines. Prior to his appointment, Ar. Ventura has been a part of the Faculty since 1991, handling architectural design subjects and manual visual techniques. An alumnus of the then UST College of Architecture and Fine Arts, he finished his Masters degree at the Mapua Institute of Technology, with his dissertation: “The Perception of the Relevance of the Graphics and Visual Techniques Courses in the Architectural Practice”.

Aside from his academic duties, Ar. Ventura is the Principal Architect of C.A. Ventura and Partners, a duly registered general professional partnership that provides comprehensive detailed architectural and engineering design services for various residential, commercial and educational establishments. He has more than 30 years of architectural practice, with some of his notable projects such as Toyota Showrooms, Mitsubishi Showrooms, McDonald’s Restaurants, Texas Roadhouse Restaurants, and the expansion of the Holy Name University in Bohol, Philippines.

Bonnie Andrew Mendoza

After his graduation in the SPRING Program (TU Dortmund and UACh – cum laude), he was hired as procurement research consultant to work with ADB in November 2014 until March 2017. Prior to obtaining his MSc degree, he was Project Officer working for the Development Academy of the Philippines. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Anthropology (cum laude) at the University of the Philippines – Diliman in 2006.

He is a member of SPRING International Association for Development Planners (since AY 2012-2013), member of Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi (since 2006), and lifetime member of Pi Gamma Mu International Honor Society in Social Sciences (since 2006).

Dr. Himanshu Shekhar

Himanshu leads the “World Risk and Adaptation Futures” programe at UNU-EHS. His work primarily focuses on two domains; first the nexus between urbanization and climate change adaptation and second, science-policy interface for providing specific scientific inputs into the UN policy making processes. He is a task team member of the United Nations’ High Level Committee of Programmes on sustainable urbanization as well as UNU’s representative for urban issues with various UN organizations.
He holds a doctorate in urban planning from the Universität Duisburg-Essen, Germany and masters in Regional Development Planning and Management, from the TU Dortmund, Germany and UACh, Chile. His bachelor education in Spatial Planning is from the SPA, New Delhi, India. He has previously worked as an urban planning consultant on issues including development plan preparation, urban transport, municipal finance etc. and has taught in the urban systems master’s programme. Himanshu has been involved with leading global think tanks and has published and presented research and policy works across global platforms.