Parallel Session 11: Bridging science and technology for mountain resilience

Local communities, from the high Himalayan region to coastal areas, are increasingly experiencing the impacts of Climate Change, including rising temperatures, erratic rainfall, glacier melt, air pollution, environmental degradation and biodiversity loss. These adverse impacts are threatening livelihoods, food security and cultural heritage.

For generations, these communities have adapted to environmental changes using traditional knowledge and indigenous practices. While traditional knowledge is locally based, its manifestations are regionally significant and globally relevant. The IPCC AR6 Report (2023) highlights and recognizes the role of indigenous knowledge in climate adaptation, biodiversity conservation and building climate resilience.

While human societies have relied on traditional knowledge for millennia, emerging technologies such as remote sensing, precision agriculture, and robotics offer new frontiers for climate adaptation and resilience building. In recent years, AI and machine learning have emerged as powerful tools to better predict extreme weather patterns more accurately, helping vulnerable communities and policy makers make informed decisions.

These technologies can be harnessed to monitor climate hazards, assess climate risks, design climate adaptation solutions, forecast weather with greater accuracy, and develop early warning systems. In Nepal, satellite data is being used to map fire risks, develop early warning for hazards like floods, droughts and extreme weather, and monitor glacial lakes. Additionally, smartphone apps are used as agro-advisories, providing farmers with real-time climate-smart recommendations.

When ancient knowledge and wisdom are combined with the power of emerging technologies, they present a unique opportunity to co-develop solutions that are culturally appropriate, scalable and sustainable. This session will explore how local community practices and traditional knowledge can be effectively bridged with emerging technologies to build climate resilience of the mountain people.

Objectives:

  1. The theme ‘bridging science and technology for mountain resilience’ aims to inspire innovation by bridging ancient and traditional knowledge with present-day scientific and technological knowledge.
  2. This theme will highlight the importance of developing synergies between generations, regions and thematic areas across the globe to innovate climate change solutions.

Moderator

DR. SANGAM SHRESTHA

Dean, School of Engineering and Technology and Professor, Water Engineering and Management, AIT

Dr. Sangam Shrestha is a Dean of School of Engineering and Technology and Professor of Water Engineering and Management at the Asian Institute of Technology, Thailand. He is also founding Co-Director of Global Water & Sanitation Center at AIT. Dr. Shrestha is also a Visiting Professor of Beijing Normal University in China, University of Yamanashi, Japan, National University of Laos, and SEI Associate of Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI). His research interests are within the field of hydrology and water resources including, climate change impact assessment and adaptation in the water, integrated water resources management and groundwater assessment and management. Dr. Shrestha has published more than 200 papers in peer-reviewed international journals and presented more than 100 conference papers ranging from hydrological modelling to climate change impacts and adaptation in the water sector. Dr. Shrestha has been awarded ‘Distinguished Research Leader Award’ in 2015 and 2019 at AIT. Recently, he has been named as one of the world’s top climate scientists in the ‘Reuters Hot List’ that identifies and ranks 1,000 climate academics according to how influential they are. In 2024, has been ranked No. 9 globally for Climate Change and River Studies by ScholarGPS, a leading scholarly analytics platform.

Keynote Speaker

MR. ABDALAH MOKSSIT

Secretary General of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change)

Abdallah Mokssit has served as Secretary of the IPCC since 2016. He holds a Master’s Degree in Mathematics from the University of Rabat, graduate degree in Meteorology from the National School of Meteorology of Toulouse, Météo-France, and second graduate degree in Telematics and Information Systems from SUPELEC in France. He joined the Centre of Studies and Information Processing in Morocco and became the Chief of dynamic meteorology service. He later became Head of a Division in the National Centre for Climate and Meteorological Research. In 2009, he was appointed Director of Morocco’s National Meteorological Department. Mr. Mokssit has received Morocco’s highest honors for his role in modernizing meteorological services, including the National Order of Merit, Excellent Class and the Throne Order, 4th Class (Knight). He brings over three decades of leadership in meteorology and climate science.

Panelists

Ms. Vibha Dhawan, Director General

The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), India

Dr. Vibha Dhawan is Director General of The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) and has been associated with the organization since 1985. She served as Vice-Chancellor of TERI School of Advanced Studies (2005–2007) and is a Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences, India. Dr. Dhawan is actively involved in national and international policy and research, particularly in agricultural biotechnology and sustainability. She serves on several government task forces and is currently an Adjunct Professor at Michigan State University. Her global roles include Advisor to CIMMYT, Coordinator for APCoAB, and Deputy Director at the Borlaug Institute. She has served on boards of top institutions including Jawaharlal Nehru University and CABI, contributing significantly to science-policy interfaces in India and abroad.

Dr. Madhav Karki

Advisor to the former Prime Minister, Nepal

Dr. Madhav Karki, until recently served as the Chief Advisor (Forestry, Environment and Climate Change) to the Hon. Forest and Env. Minister, Govt. of Nepal. He also served as the Env. And Climate Change Adviser to the then PM Rt. Hon. Sher Bahadur Deuba during 2021-22. He is the founding Executive Director and currently Chair of the not-for-profit research to policy Think Tank organization – Centre for Green Economy Development, Nepal (www.cgednepal.org). He has successfully led the professional team to undertake major assignments for the Govt. of Nepal ministries and international organizations. He most recently served as the Team Leader of the Capacity Building Project of the GCF NDA Partners and Private Sector Initiative Project under the supervision of the Ministry of Finance, GoN and the AEPC. Dr. Karki has close to 45 years of professional experiences in Government agencies, academia and international organizations. He served as the Campus chief/Asst.Dean/Acting Dean of the Institute of Forestry (1983-1995), Senior Program Officer of the IDRC, Canada (1995-2005); and Deputy Director General of ICIMOD (2005-12).

His long and diverse professional experiences and vast knowledge are in the areas of Environment, Nature Conservation, Natural Resources Management, Sustainable Development, Climate Change Science and Indigenous Knowledge and Practices. His research, teaching and advocacy work includes trans-disciplinary, interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary fields collectively contributing to system transformation, climate resilient development and sustainable development. He has vast professional experience of working in Southeast Asia and Hindi Kush Himalayan countries with some experience of working in Sub-Saharan Africa also. He successfully worked as the Co-Chair of the IPBES/UN commissioned Asia-Pacific Regional Assessment of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (2015-18)(https://www.ipbes.net/assessment-reports/asia-pacific. He has headed numerous national and international research projects and currently serves as a member in the Steering Committee guiding a Research on Food System Transformation in the Indo-Gangetic plain of Nepal, India and Bangladesh. Dr. Karki is currently one of the lead CLA of the UNEP’s GEO7 (https://www.unep.org/geo/global-environment-outlook-7. He also served as a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the UNEP’s Synthesis Report on: Making Peace with Nature: https://www.unep.org/resources/making-peace-nature#: He has been serving as a member of the Multidisciplinary Expert Panel (MEP) of IPBES/UN (2019-2026)(www.ipbes.net). Dr. Karki has more than 110 scientific publications to his credit.

Dr. Stefan Schneiderbauer

United Nations University- Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS), Germany & Eurac Research, Italy

Dr Stefan Schneiderbauer is Head of Center for Global Mountain Safeguard Research (GLOMOS) since its establishment in 2019.

Dr. Klaus Hubacek

Faculty of Science and Engineering, University of Groningen, The Netherlands

Prof. Klaus Hubacek is a Professor in Science, Technology and Society at the University of Groningen and Chair of both IREES and ESRIG. He is also a visiting professor at the University of Maryland. His research models interactions between human and environmental systems, with over 200 peer-reviewed publications on climate adaptation, mitigation, land use, and sustainability. Klaus has held positions at the University of Cambridge, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and IIASA, and led projects funded by Horizon 2020 and NASA. A highly cited researcher, he has advised national agencies across Europe, Asia, and the U.S., as well as global institutions like the World Bank and IADB. He was a Lead Author of the IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report, contributing to chapters on behavior and consumption-based emissions.