In 2017, Matthias was assigned as Director for the Cluster “Agriculture and Food” in Bangkok leading various project teams in Thailand and the ASEAN region on Sustainable Agrifood Systems, Public Private Partnerships, Supply Chain Upgrading, Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation, and Agricultural Finance as well as Upscaling of Outreach Initiatives. He currently serves on various boards and committees including the Interim Board of the Sustainable Rice Platform which he has also co-founded. In 2012, Matthias was honoured as an Asia-Europe Young Leader at the Asia Pacific Conference in New Delhi.

 

He holds degrees (master level) in Economics, in Business Administration, and in Business Law and Economic Law as well as a PhD in Public International Law from Martin-Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg, Germany. He has also studied at University of Sydney, Australia, specializing in development economics and international finance and banking. He has published various journal articles, discussion papers and monographs in the fields of international finance, agricultural development, regional integration and trade law.

Jens, an Agronomist and Environmental Engineer, has worked for Helvetas since 2003 for the facilitation and implementation of sustainable commodity value chains and corresponding public-private partnership projects (PPP) or sector approaches.

 

He has been appointed as an expert for the EU Commission for industry sectors like agriculture, textiles and cosmetics aiming to bring in sustainability challenges in the South into corresponding regulations of the EU. Jens is also nominated as an expert to the sustainability panel of the International Cotton Advisory Committee ICAC and acted as head of the Swiss mirror group for the upcoming ISO standard for sustainable cocoa.

Beau is the Natural Resource Officer – Climate Change and Bioenergy – for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific. Over the past 15 years Beau has worked as a natural resource management specialist focused on promoting equitable, climate resilient and low emissions development in the region.

​

Beau has experience delivering regional and national policy and field–level technical assistance programs on climate change adaptation and mitigation and renewable energy development in over 20 countries in South, Southeast Asia, the Pacific and Southern Africa. Most recently Beau has been leading the implementation of FAO work programs in Asia on resilient, low emission agriculture and initiatives to scale-up investment in the agriculture and land-use sectors in support of the UNFCCC Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals.

Margaret is responsible for the review of California compliance and voluntary market project listings and for providing oversight to project verification, registration and offset issuance for a variety of project types. She also serves as a team member for offset methodology development and approvals.

​

Margaret has experience in GHG emissions verification, carbon offset project development, various GHG reporting protocols and GHG inventory and reduction plan development. At Impact Carbon, Margaret served as Program Manager for carbon asset development, various GHG reporting schemes and overseeing all survey design, fuel and emissions data collection, data analysis and document preparation for carbon asset validation and verification under the UN’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and the Gold Standard.

​

From 2009 to 2013 Margaret was a senior climate change and air quality project manager and technical specialist at ICF International where she developed GHG emissions inventories and reduction plans for cities and counties in California as well as analyzed environmental data for regulatory compliance. She was a certified lead verifier (2009-2015) under the California Air Resources Board Mandatory Reporting Rule with Refineries and Transactions specialties and has conducted GHG audits for landfills and oil and gas facilities under the British Columbia and Alberta reporting schemes.

Since joining the Asian Development Bank in 2010, Alvin Lopez has been leading initiatives on environment, natural resources management in the China and Mongolia, and since August 2018 in Cambodia. Prior to ADB, Alvin’s key roles included functioning as UNDP’s International Transboundary Advisor for an integrated lake basin management initiative in the Balkans, and over five years in the Mekong region helping integrate ecosystems, biodiversity and water resources management considerations into the sustainable development agenda.

​

Alvin, who is also a joint lead author of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005) began his professional career in 1996, and holds a bachelor’s degree in Environmental Science and Management, and a Masters in Conservation Biology.

Colin Taylor has worked for IFC for over 10 years and is the East Asia Pacific Regional Lead for Agribusiness Advisory Services. He is also a senior agribusiness technical specialist.

​

Prior to IFC, Colin worked across Africa, Europe, Asia and Australasia for a range of private sector companies including Unilever, Chiquita, Geest, Linton Park Plc and Rentokil managing large agribusiness operations and supply chains. He also ran a highly successful consultancy business with a range of clients including large agribusiness and food companies, public sector government agencies and development organisations.

​

Colin has career long experience developing and managing smallholder focused supply chains and has a special interest in supporting them to work with large agribusiness companies to create win-win relationships.