A new key biodiversity platform for cross sectoral collaboration
For its inaugural launch, World Biodiversity Summit will help define what world leaders and the private sector in biodiversity and climate action need to do in the medium and long term to achieve sustainable development and hinder further biodiversity loss, focusing on partnerships and investment mechanisms as levers of progress. World Biodiversity Summit is a platform for responding to accelerating biodiversity loss, by using the Paris Agreement as a framework to learn from, promoting relevant solutions, innovations, and leadership networks, strengthening nature restoration and conservation. Nature-based solutions will be highlighted, from specificecosystems to global possibilities.
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Ashok Lavasa
Vice-President for Private Sector Operations and Public-Private Partnerships at Asian Development Bank
Mr. Ashok Lavasa is the Vice President for Private Sector Operations and Public Private Partnerships (VPPP) with the Asian Development Bank. Prior to joining ADB in September 2020, Mr. Lavasa was an Election Commissioner in India from January 2018 to August 2020, a constitutional position appointed by the President of India.
Mr. Lavasa served for nearly four decades with various government agencies in India including as Union Finance Secretary, Secretary Environment & Climate Change and Secretary Civil Aviation. He also served as Additional Secretary and Special Secretary for Power. As a senior member of the Indian Administrative Service, Mr. Lavasa was associated with a broad array of public policy and program implementation initiatives
covering the finance, power, environment and climate change, civil aviation, infrastructure, and tourism sectors. He led the official Indian delegation for climate change negotiations for the Paris Agreement at COP21.
He is the author of a book ‘An Ordinary Life: Portrait of an Indian Generation’ published in July 2021 by Harper Collins. Earlier, he has authored a book titled An Uncivil Servant (Rupa: 2006) and has written several book chapters and academic papers covering climate change, economic policy, and energy. He completed M. Phil. from Madras University (India), MBA from Southern Cross University (Australia) and MA (English) from Delhi University (India).