Shinji Kaneko (Chair)
Director, NERPS / Professor, Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences

Shinji Kaneko is the Executive Vice President for Global Initiatives and a Professor at the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Science at Hiroshima University. He graduated from the School of Engineering at Kyushu University majoring in water engineering (Dr. of Engineering). Immediately after the completion of his doctoral program, he joined the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES) in 1999 as a researcher and conducted research on urban climate policy in Asian megacities for three years. He also worked at global Change System for Analysis, Research and Training (START) as a Research Fellow for three years from 2005. In 2018, he was appointed as the Director of Network for Education and Research on Peace and Sustainability (NERPS) at Hiroshima University. He has conducted numerous policy research on natural resources, energy, and the environment in developing countries.

Ayyoob Sharifi (Co-Chair)
Associate Professor, Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences

Ayyoob Sharifi is an Associate Professor at the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Hiroshima University. He also has a cross-appointment at the Graduate School of Advanced Science and Engineering of Hiroshima University, and is a research fellow at the Network for Education and Research on Peace and Sustainability (NERPS). Additionally, he serves as a visiting scholar at the National Institute for Environmental Studies, Japan. His research is mainly at the interface of urbanism and climate change mitigation and adaptation. Ayyoob actively contributes to global change research programs such as the Future Earth and is currently serving as a lead author for the Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Before joining Hiroshima University, he was the Executive Director of the Global Carbon Project (GCP)-a Future Earth core project. There, he was leading the urban flagship activity of the project that is focused on conducting cutting-edge research for supporting climate change mitigation and adaptation in cities. He holds a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering (Surveying), a master’s degree in Urban and Regional Planning, and a doctorate in Environmental Engineering. He has published extensively on issues related to urban environmental science and is interested in pursuing research at the interface of climate change and urban planning. The ultimate goal of his research is to provide further insights into how to develop sustainable, peaceful, just, and resilient urban communities.

Dahlia Simangan (Co-Chair)
Associate Professor, Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences

Dahlia Simangan is an Associate Professor at Hiroshima University’s Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences where she teaches Global Governance and Peacebuilding Case Studies. She is a former Kanagawa University JSPS Postdoctoral Research Fellow (nominated by the United Nations University-Centre for Policy Research in Tokyo). She obtained her PhD in International, Political and Strategic Studies from the Australian National University in 2017, her MA in International Relations from the International University of Japan in 2010, and her BA in Sociology from the University of the Philippines, Diliman in 2006. Her research interest in peace and conflict studies includes topics on international peacebuilding, the United Nations peacekeeping operations, and International Relations in the Anthropocene. She is the Assistant Editor of Peacebuilding and a member of the Planet Politics Institute.

Akira Hibiki
Professor and Head of Policy Design Lab. at Graduate School of Economics and Management, Tohoku University

Akira Hibiki is Professor and Head of Policy Design Lab. at Graduate School of Economics and Management, Tohoku University. He is also Head of a Research Group in Social Systems Division at National Institute for Environmental Studies (NIES) and Consulting Fellow at Research Institute of Economy, Trade, and Industry (RIETI). 
In the past, he served as President of Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies (SEEPS) in FY2018~2019. He also held positions as Professor in Faculty of Economics at Sophia University, Head of Environmental Economics Division at National Institute for Environmental Studies, and Associate Professor in Graduate School of Decision Science and Technology at Tokyo Institute of Technology.
He conducted empirical studies on the relationship between trade and environment, the impact of the company’s environmental action (such as the adoption of the certified environmental management system, environmental performance, action for CSR) on the stock market, and estimation of water and energy demands under block rate pricing. He has published articles in international academic journals such as the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Land Economics, World Development, Econometric Reviews, etc.
His current research focuses on the economic impacts due to climate change (temperature rise and extreme weather) in Japan and some developing countries (Vietnam, Panama, Kenya, etc.) and the health impact of outdoor pollution and indoor pollution of PM2.5 in Bangladesh.
He received his Ph.D. from Sophia University.

Fumiko Kasuga
Future Earth, Global Hub Director, Japan: Executive Team

Fumiko Kasuga is Senior Fellow at the National Institute for Environmental Studies and a Visiting Professor at The University of Tokyo. She is also former Vice-President of the Science Council of Japan and a member of ICSU’s Committee on Scientific Planning and Review. Fumiko has worked as a government researcher in the field of public health, in particular on microbiological food safety in the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan. Internationally she has worked with the World Health Organization, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the International Commission on Microbiological Specifications for Foods. She has been engaged in Future Earth since she was in charge of international activities of Science Council of Japan.

Vally Koubi
Professor and Senior Scientist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH)

Vally Koubi is a Professor (Titular) and Senior Scientist at the Center for Comparative and International Studies (CIS) at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH), and a professor at the Institute of Economics at the University of Bern, Switzerland. She is presently the director of the CIS at ETH Zurich.
Vally Koubi was born in Greece and is a citizen of Greece and the USA. She studied Public Law and Political Science at the Law School of the University of Athens, Greece (B.A. in 1983). She received an M.S. in Public Policy (1985), an M.A. (1988), and a Ph.D. in Political Science (1991), all from the University of Rochester, USA. She taught at the Department of Government and The Washington Semester Program at the American University in Washington D.C. (1989-​1990), and at the Department of Political Science of the University of Buffalo (1990-​1991). From 1991 to 1998 she was an assistant professor at the Department of Political Science of the University of Georgia, USA. She has been a visiting professor at the Department of Political Science at the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium (1994-​1995), and at the Institute for European Studies at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium (1997-​1998). She also spent 1996-​1997 as a TMR Fellow at the Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE) at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium. She joined the ETH and the University of Bern in 1999.
Koubi’s research focuses on the social consequences of climate change and the determinants of domestic environmental policies and outcomes as well as international environmental cooperation across countries and time. Her research on the social consequences of climate change aims at understanding the effects of extreme weather or extreme climate events on migration and conflict mainly in the developing world. This research combines perspectives from different social science disciplines and employs a wide range of research methods, including macro-quantitative analyses and micro-level surveys, survey experiments, and field experiments in several countries such as Bangladesh, Cambodia, Kenya, Nicaragua, Peru, Uganda, and Vietnam. She has published articles in journals including Annual Review of Political Science, Climatic Change, Ecological Economics, European Political Science Review, Global Environmental Politics, International Organization, Journal of Peace Research, Nature Climate Change, Population & Environment, Review of International Organizations, and World Development.

Paul Shrivastava
Chief Sustainability Officer, Penn State University, United States

Paul Shrivastava is Chief Sustainability Officer of Penn State University. He is also Director of Sustainability Institute and Professor of Management at the Smeal College of Business.  Prior to this, he served as the first Executive Director of Future Earth global research platform. He is a member of The Club of Rome and leads the UNESCO Chair on Arts and Science for Implementing the SDGs at ICN, Nancy, France.
Paul is an academic entrepreneur.  He was part of the team that founded Hindustan Computer Ltd., one of India’s largest computer companies.  He founded the non-profit Industrial Crisis Institute, Inc. New York.  He founded the journal Organization and Environment, (published by Sage Publications).  He was founding President and CEO of eSocrates, Inc., a knowledge management software company, and the founding Chair of the Organizations and the Natural Environment Division of the Academy of Management.
Paul’s research uses science and arts to develop transdisciplinary solutions to sustainability challenges. His current focus is on the implementation of Sustainable Development Goals. He is working with colleagues at Penn State, at Future Earth, and at the United Nations to develop programs for implementing SDGs, and monitoring and measuring their progress. He believes that infusing sustainability across research, teaching, community, and student engagement at Penn State University’s 23 campuses can help us implement sustainability across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Paul received his Ph. D. from the University of Pittsburgh. He has published 17 books and over 100 articles in refereed and scholarly journals. He has served on the editorial boards of numerous leading management education journals. His work was recognized with a Fulbright Senior Scholar Award and IIM Calcutta Distinguished Alumni Award.

Hassan Virji
Emeritus Executive Director, START International

Hassan Virji is the Emeritus Executive Director of START International, Inc., a non-governmental organization operating as the Global Change System for Analysis, Research and Training, that he established in 1992. His expertise is in building systems-level capacities in global change to foster resilient and sustainable societies. He is a graduate of the Universities of Daressalaam, Nairobi and Madison-Wisconsin. He worked at the University of Nairobi and the University of Wisconsin, and was a Senior Fellow at the Wissenschaft Kolleg in Berlin. During 1983-1988 he was Associate Director of the Climate Dynamics Program of the US National Science Foundation; during 1989-1990, Deputy Executive Director of the International Geosphere- Biosphere Programme, and Executive Secretary of the US Inter-agency Subcommittee on Global Change Research (1991-1992) where he was involved in setting up the US Global Change Research Program. Dr. Virji is a National Associate Member of the National Research Council of the National Academies of the USA. He is a member of the Governing Board of CRDF Global of USA, and previously was on the Boards of International Centers of excellence located at CSIR/South Africa, Academia Sinica/Taipei, Education, Learning, and Research for Humanitarian Assistance/UK, and the Manila Observatory of the Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines. During 2014 he was a Visiting Professor at Kyoto University, an Adjunct Professor in Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center and Geography at the University of Maryland, College Park during 2016-2018, a Visiting Professor at Kyoto during 2014, and at Keio, and Hiroshima Universities in Japan during 2019, and currently is a member of the External Evaluation Committee of the International Leadership Development Program of Hiroshima University. He is a member of the editorial boards of “Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability”, “Advances in Climate Change Research”, “Climate, Disasters, and Development” and “Progress in Disaster Science”.