Thematic session 4: Sustainable transport and green development: climate change mitigation, adaptation and resilience

Mr. Zhao Chongjiu is Vice Minister of Transport. He was born in 1965 in Liaoning Province. He is responsible for water transport management, safety supervision management, infrastructure quality supervision, search and rescue and emergency management. Since 2021, he is Member of the CPC Group and Vice Minister, Ministry of Transport (MOT), China. From 2017-2021, he was Vice President of the People's Government of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, China. From 2016-2017, he was Member of the CPC Group and Chief Planner, MOT, China Director-General, Department of Comprehensive Planning, MOT, China. From 2014-2016, he was Chief Engineer, MOT, China. From 2011-2014, he was Director-General, Department of Science and Technology, MOT, China. From 2009-2011, he was Secretary of the Party Committee and Deputy Director, China Communications Press.

The Special Adviser ensures delivery of the Secretary-General’s priorities on climate change, from enhanced nationally determined contributions, fossil fuel and coal phase-out, ensuring public and private finance shifts and the transitions necessary to shift the world’s energy, transportation, land and natural systems in alignment with the goals of the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals. Before his appointment, Selwin Hart served as the Executive Director for the Caribbean region at the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB). He was previously the Ambassador to the United States and the Organization of American States for Barbados and Director of the Secretary-General’s Climate Change Support Team, leading the team’s delivery of the 2014 Climate Summit and the Secretary-General’s engagement in the process leading to the signing of the Paris Agreement on climate change. Throughout his career, Mr. Hart has served in several climate action leadership positions, including as a Climate Adviser for the Caribbean Development Bank, Chief Climate Change Negotiator for Barbados, as well as the Coordinator and Lead Negotiator on Finance for the Alliance of Small Island Developing States, a coalition of 43 islands and low-lying coastal States in the Caribbean, Pacific, Africa, Indian Ocean and South China Sea. He was a member of the Kyoto Protocol Adaptation Fund Board from 2009 to 2010 and was elected by the United Nations General Assembly to serve as Vice-Chair of the Second Committee of the United Nations General Assembly (Economic and Financial) during its sixtieth Session.

Ms. Maruxa Cardama is the Secretary General of the SLOCAT Partnership on Sustainable, Low Carbon Transport. Over her 16-year career, she has worked with multilateral institutions, national, regional and local governments, NGOs and philanthropy in 33 countries across continents to develop public policies, capacity and implementation projects, and multi-stakeholder partnerships that advance sustainability and equitable prosperity. Ms. Cardama is known to many SLoCaT members as the founder of the Communitas Coalition, the multi-stakeholder coalition which pioneered knowledge-based advocacy for the Sustainable Development Goal on Cities and Human Settlements (SDG 11). Ms. Cardama also served as the Secretary General for the Network of Regional Governments for Sustainable Development (nrg4SD), and during her tenure co-facilitated the engagement of local and regional governments in the UN Rio +20 Conference. She has held posts in the Cities Alliance (hosted by the UN Office for Project Services UNOPS), as well as in local and regional government in Spain and in the UK. Prolific public speaker and analyst, Maruxa is member of the Urban Knowledge-Action Network of Future Earth. In recent years, she has served in the Expert Panel on the urban science-policy interface of the University Colleague London UCL-Nature Sustainability and as Adviser on Global Agendas to the Conference of European Peripheral Maritime Regions of Europe CPMR. Her formal training was as a lawyer, as well as in EU law and in development economics. 

Mr. Oliver Lah leads the Urban Change Maker Group at the TU Berlin, which is an international capacity building programme for young professionals working on urban development issues. He is head of the Mobility and International Cooperation research unit at the Wuppertal Institute and coordinates the SOLUTIONSplus project, which supports urban electric mobility in Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America. Mr. Lah is also the Coordinator of the Urban Electric Mobility Initiative (UEMI) and UN-Habitat’s Urban Pathways partnership. Mr. Lah has worked with international organisations, such as the OECD/ITF, UN-Habitat, UN Environment, UNDP and GIZ on urban mobility and climate change issues. He was a lead author for the fifth IPCC Assessment Report and was a member of the Habitat III Policy Unit on Urban Services and Technology. He teaches at the universities of Berlin and Rotterdam Prior to that Mr. Lah worked for the New Zealand government, the University of Munich and the Minister of State to the German Federal Chancellor. He holds a Bachelor of Arts with Honours in Political Science, a Master of Environmental Studies from Victoria University of Wellington and a PhD in Urban Ecology from Technical University.

Mr. Drew Kodjak is an environmental attorney with 25 years of experience working with governments to address air pollution from vehicles and fuels. Mr. Kodjak is currently the executive director of the International Council on Clean Transportation, an organization that he co-founded in 2005 to support governments in the top vehicle markets develop policies to improve the environmental performance and energy efficiency of all modes of vehicles and fuels. Prior to joining the ICCT, Mr. Kodjak served as Attorney-Advisor for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, during which time he contributed to regulatory developments of major rulemakings. Mr. Kodjak held a number of previous positions with a range of non-profit organizations including the Bipartisan Policy Center (then NCEP), and the Northeast States for Coordinated Air Use Management (NESCAUM). Mr. Kodjak is a graduate of New York University and Boston University Law School where he graduated with honors in 1991. Mr. Kodjak serves on a number of important committees and organizations related to his work on transportation and air pollution. Mr. Kodjak is a member of the following organizations: Transportation Research Board Committee on Alternative Transportation Fuels and Technologies and U.S. Department of Energy’s Hydrogen Fuel Cell Partnership. Mr. Kodjak previously served on the National Academies of Sciences Panel on Medium and Heavy-duty Vehicle Fuel Economy (2008 – 2010), and was co-chair of the U.S. Mobile Source Technical Advisory Committee (2010 – 2016). He speaks internationally on the topic of air pollution and transportation.

Mr. Peter Nuttall is the Scientific and Technical Advisor for the Micronesian Center for Sustainable Transport. He wrote his PhD thesis on the potential for wind energy for shipping in the Pacific and established low carbon shipping as a priority multi-disciplinary research theme for USP since 2012. He has published and presented regionally and globally across this field since. Between 2008-2012 he supervised the first village-based surveys of maritime transport and fuel dependency at village level in Fiji. Since then, he has been involved in action research in low carbon transport from the village to the global, including the current IMO work on decarbonization of international shipping. Mr. Nuttall is also an acknowledged expert on the heritage of drua/kalia canoe technology in Central Oceania. With his sons he has built and operates the replica drua i Vola Siga Vou. He has sailed extensively in the Pacific for 30 years and lives with his family on a sailing ship in Fiji which generates all its electricity renewably.

Ms. Hannah Murdock is REN21’s NDC-TIA project manager, knowledge and policy analysis lead, and director of India and regional/global activities. She is a project manager and analyst working on the Renewables Global Status Report and reports related to renewables in transport.

Mr. SUN Zhen is Deputy Director General of the Department of Climate Change of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment. Department of Climate Change takes the leading role in addressing climate change and greenhouse gas emission reduction; carry out China’s role in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and work with relevant governmental departments to participate in international negotiations and conferences; promote multilateral, bilateral and South-South cooperation; develop and administer national carbon emission rights trading markets.

Mr. Juan Carlos Salazar is the Secretary General of the ICAO. He was first appointed for a three‐year term starting August 2021.  His career in international civil aviation spans over 27 years in various advisory and leadership roles. Prior to his appointment as Secretary General, Mr. Salazar served as Director General of Aeronautica Civil of Colombia – Aerocivil. For the twelve years previous to joining Aerocivil, Mr. Salazar was a Senior Advisor to the UAE General Civil Aviation Authority. His professional experience also includes terms as the President of Latin American Civil Aviation Commission (LACAC), Secretary of the Colombian Civil Aviation Board and Director of its Air Transport Office, Director General of Air Transport at the Colombian Ministry of Transport, Corporate Secretary and Director of the Legal Department of Tampa Cargo (currently known as Avianca Cargo). Mr. Salazar is a lawyer and has earned advanced degrees from Harvard University (Master in Public Administration ‐ MPA) and McGill University (Master in Air and Space Law ‐ LLM).

Mr. Daniele Violetti is the Senior Director of the Programmes Coordination and Director a.i. of the Means of Implementation (MoI) Division. As Senior Director he provides strategic direction and oversight in relation to the work of the Programmes Department, comprised of the four Programmes divisions (Adaptation, Means of Implementation, Mitigation, Transparency). He ensures strategic, substantive and administrative coherence and synergy in the delivery of their work programmes, including in relation to the established intergovernmental processes and constituted bodies. The MoI Division supports international cooperation on the mobilization of financial resources, technology development and transfer, and building of individual, institutional and systemic capacity to enable and support Parties to take enhanced action on climate change. In particular, it supports the work of the Standing Committee on Finance and the Technology Executive Committee and the Paris Committee on Capacity Building. The MoI Division also coordinates the secretariat’s outreach to the United Nations system. Prior to his current position, he served as Chief of Staff of the secretariat for seven years, supporting two Executive Secretaries. He was also Coordinator for the United Nations Secretary-General's High-level Advisory Group on Climate Change Financing (AGF) at the United Nation Headquarters in New York. He has extensive experience on issues related to the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) under the Kyoto Protocol and he served as Secretary to the CDM Executive Board (EB) as well as a Manager in the CDM Process Management unit within the Sustainable Development Mechanisms programme at the UNFCCC secretariat.

Mr. Fu Gangfeng is Director of the Board, President and Deputy Party Secretary of China COSCO SHIPPING Corporation Limited. Mr. Fu Gangfeng successively served as Deputy Director of Zhong Hua (Shekou) Accounting Firm, General Manager of Chief Accountant Office, Vice Chief Financial Officer and Chief Financial Officer of China Merchants Shekou Industrial Zone Company Limited and Chief Financial Officer of China Merchants Shekou Holdings Company Limited. He also acted as General Manager of Finance Department, Vice Chief Financial Officer and Chief Financial Officer of China Merchants Group Limited, Chairman and Executive Director of China Merchants Port Holdings Company Limited, Vice Chairman of China Merchants Bank as well as Director and President of China Merchants Group Limited. With nearly 30 years of corporate management experience, Mr. Fu has abundant experience in enterprise operation management, financial management and capital operation. He took his current post in September 2019.