UNITED NATIONS FOUNDATION - Key Persons
A Scot, David graduated with an honours degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Strathclyde. After a brief spell in the engineering and construction industry, David joined Shell in 1984 as a process engineer and spent his early years in design and operational roles across the UK, in particular gas processing facilities.
In 1991 he embarked on an international career with Project Management, and Economics & Planning roles in Oman before embracing commercial roles in the Netherlands and USA to create and deliver new technology companies from Shell's intellectual property base. Returning to the UK in 2002, David was made the Asset Manager for a large offshore oil and gas business division, latterly as a Director of Shell UK Ltd., during which time he won the UK Oil & Gas Industry's Mentoring Award in recognition of his leadership skills and ability to motivate and mentor staff.
He was appointed VP Safety & Environment for Shell Upstream International in 2008 and a year later as Shell Group Functional Head of Sustainable Development, responsible for overseeing Shell's Sustainability, Social Performance and Social Investment agenda. David also acted as Secretary to the Board Committee on Corporate & Social Responsibility, as well as a member of Shell's Upstream International Leadership Team. In early 2013 David was appointed VP Production for Shell upstream activities in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Job Titles:
- Communications Director of the WLPGA
Alison Abbott is the Communications Director of the WLPGA joined the association in October 2010. Alison manages the association's global communications strategy and is responsible for the communications initiatives of the WLPGA for its members and stakeholders, for the global rollout of the Exceptional Energy brand and coordinates the newly launched Women in LPG Global Network (WINLPG). Alison has previously held similar positions with telecommunications and software companies both in France and the UK. Alison is British and has lived in Paris for 14 years.
Job Titles:
- Regional Market Manager for Bangladesh
Asna Towfiq is the Regional Market Manager for Bangladesh. Previously Asna worked for "Katalyst," a market development project whose goal is to contribute to increased income for poor men and women in rural and urban areas, and implemented by Swisscontact and GIZ International Services under the umbrella of the Ministry of Commerce, Bangladesh. She has managed sectors like Furniture, Crafts, Tourism and Aquaculture in developing small businesses and entrepreneurs and expanding their markets. She also has experience in mainstreaming gender and women's economic empowerment primarily in agricultural sector. She has extensive knowledge and experience on Market Development, Value chain analysis, Monitoring and Results Measurement and also Gender Mainstreaming. Asna did her bachelors in Business and Economics from North South University, and her Masters in Development Studies at Brac University.
Job Titles:
- Co - Leader of the Working Group 3
Basudev Upadhyay, Co-Leader of the Working Group 3: Field Testing Guidelines for ISO Technical Committee 285 - Clean Cookstoves and Clean Cooking Solutions is affiliated with Centre for Rural Technology, Nepal as a Regional Cookstoves Testing and Knowledge Centre, (RTKC) coordinator. He leads a Research and Development unit at the Centre. Mr. Upadhyay is also a serving as team leader for the project ‘Product Development and Labeling of Clean Cookstoves and Standardized Biomass Fuels for Nepali Market' and managing number of other research projects at the Center. Academically he is an environmental graduate specilized in mountain ecology with due interest in sustainable development and alternative energy.
Ms. Dana Harmon Charron is co-founder of Berkeley Air Monitoring Group, an organization that monitors and evaluates household energy for health and climate outcomes. Previously, Ms. Charron developed a cookstove program within the University of California Berkeley. Ms. Charron has also led initiatives at Green America, Greenpeace International, and Rainforest Action Network. She holds an MBA from UC Berkeley, a BA from Wellesley College, and is mother to two children
Job Titles:
- Chief Product Officer
- Co - Founder
Boston Nyer is a Co-Founder and the Chief Product Officer of BURN, a company that designs, locally manufactures and distributes clean burning cookstoves. BURN sells more than 10,000 cookstoves through commercial channels in East Africa each month. Their modern manufacturing facility outside of Nairobi makes one stove per minute and is the largest of its kind on the continent. Boston's current role is to lead the Production, Engineering, Quality, Inventory, Supply Chain and Market Research Departments as well as working on new product commercialization, fundraising and overall business strategy. Before BURN, Boston was working as a consultant for biomass energy and international development. He holds degrees from the University of Rochester (Biomedical Engineering) and the University of Colorado (Engineering for Developing Communities).
Job Titles:
- Senior Program Manager at Del
Christina Barstow is the Senior Program Manager at DelAgua Health. Christina works in the design and management of DelAgua's health program in Rwanda, including the development of their behavior change program and the on-going evaluation and monitoring. She has been working in international development for the past eight years on the research and implementation of appropriate technologies in the energy and water sector. Christina received her Bachelor's and Master's in Environmental Engineering from the University of Colorado and is currently a Mortenson Fellow pursing a PhD focusing on the benefits of large scale program implementation in developing communities.
Job Titles:
- Director, Gender & Humanitarian
Corinne Hart is the Director, Gender & Humanitarian Programs for the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves. She works closely on the gender impacts and livelihood creation opportunities within energy access issues. Prior to her work on increasing access to energy and clean cooking technology in the developing world at the UN Foundation, she worked in the Capitol Hill office of California Congresswoman Grace Napolitano. From 2003-2005, Ms. Hart was a corps member of Teach for America and taught special education for two years in New York City. In 2005, she traveled extensively through Latin America and taught at an orphanage in Sucre, Bolivia. She has a Bachelor's in Critical Gender Studies and Political Science and a Master's of Science in Education.
Job Titles:
- Co - Founder and COO of Essmart
Diana Jue is co-founder and COO of Essmart, a last-mile distribution company for life-improving technologies like clean cookstoves in south Indian villages through rural stores. Before starting Essmart, Diana studied technology dissemination through her undergraduate and graduate studies at MIT. Throughout her fieldwork, she saw that many development initiatives were not achieving their intended impact because of poorly established distribution channels. She explored this further through her MIT Master's thesis, which served as one of Essmart's foundations. Diana's writing has been featured in publications including the USAID Frontiers in Development and Stanford Social Innovation Review blog. She has been awarded the Fulbright-Nehru Research Fellowship to India and the Echoing Green Fellowship for social entrepreneurs.
Job Titles:
- Founder and Director of Global HearthWorks Foundation
Dr. Ashley Pettus is the founder and director of Global HearthWorks Foundation (GHWF), a non-profit based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She most recently funded and managed a pilot project in Lusaka, Zambia to test market demand in low-income neighborhoods for sustainably harvested fuel wood in combination with an improved rocket stove. Dr. Pettus holds a Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology from UC Berkeley and previously worked as a freelance writer before founding GHWF in 2014. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the United States.
Dr. Daniel Mäusezahl (MSc, PhD MPH) provides expertise in the epidemiology of enteric disease and water and sanitation interventions. He has experience in research on sanitation and enteric infections in both low-income and industrialized country settings, and he is a former senior adviser in this area at Swiss Development Cooperation. He leads the research group on Household Health Systems within the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Swiss Tropical & Public Health Institute (Swiss TPH). His research deals mainly with environmental, health and social impact assessment and he conducts health systems research focusing on environmental health, WASH and integrated approaches to improve household and environmental health.
Honorable Dr. Kwabena Donkor is Ghana's first Minister of Power and also the Member of Parliament for the Pru East Constituency and the immediate past Chairman of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Mines and Energy.
Hon. Dr. Donkor has been an academic, technocrat and presently a political leader. He has lectured at the University of Bristol (UK) and the Central University College (Ghana). He was the pioneer Chief Executive of the Bulk Oil Storage and Transportation Company Ltd., (BOST) the State-owned petroleum Logistics Company with depots and pipelines across the country. Dr. Donkor was also the pioneer Chief Executive of the Petroleum Commission, the upstream regulator. He has also been the Deputy Minister of Energy with responsibility for Oil and Gas and later Power. Dr. Kwabena Donkor holds MSc. and PhD degrees from the University of Bristol and the MBA degree from Lancaster Management School, University of Lancaster. He is also a Fellow of the Chartered Management Institute (UK), a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (UK) and a Member of the Chartered Institute of Energy (UK).
Mr. Avik Roy in his advisory and practitioner role has been part of teams in India, Vietnam, and South Africa that develop and pilot innovative models for introducing clean cooking solutions to low income populations. His firm Re-emerging World Consulting Private Limited is engaged as a knowledge partner of USAID's wPOWER India program. Mr. Roy previously worked with business professor C.K. Prahalad and is a gold medalist at the Indian Institute of Management.
Mr. Ben West is the Founder and CEO of EcoZoom. He is the architect of EcoZoom's overall vision and strategies for new products, services, and markets, and he works closely with EcoZoom's engineering and market research program, creates project opportunities and partnerships, and helps develop a positive and high-value company culture. Before starting EcoZoom, Mr. West had experience in entrepreneurship and in the cookstove space. Mr. West has watched EcoZoom grow from a start-up with $40,000 in founder funding to a global company with thriving stove programs in Rwanda and Kenya and a growing presence in Mexico and several African countries. Mr. West received his MBA at the University of Oregon with a focus on entrepreneurship.
Mr. Benson Keya has trained in IT, web design, and sustainable agriculture and has 10 years of practical experience in community development as a climate change activist. Mr. Keya has been working to create inclusive solutions to solve the climate change crisis. At JATONET, Mr. Keya works as the treasurer, and manages the organization's websites, social media, and communications channels. Mr. Keya has also been working to educate women and girls on the issues of clean cooking business models.
Job Titles:
- Managing Director for East Africa
Job Titles:
- Fellow at Stockholm Environment Institute
- Stockholm Environment
Ms. Anne Nyambane is a Research Associate and an ESPA Fellow at Stockholm Environment Institute, Africa centre. Ms. Nyambane's work focuses on links between sustainable energy and ecosystem services at the household and policy levels. She is currently exploring how biofuels for the household sector can become an agent of poverty alleviation in Malawi and Mozambique. Previously, Ms. Nyambane worked on improved institutional cookstoves in Kenyan schools as part of a combined master's dissertation and UNDP project.
Job Titles:
- Co - Founder of Berkeley Air Monitoring Group
Ms. Dana Harmon Charron is co-founder of Berkeley Air Monitoring Group, an organization that monitors and evaluates household energy for health and climate outcomes. Previously, Ms. Charron developed a cookstove program within the University of California Berkeley. Ms. Charron has also led initiatives at Green America, Greenpeace International, and Rainforest Action Network. She holds an MBA from UC Berkeley, a BA from Wellesley College, and is mother to two children