Advisory Board
The Averted Disaster Award Advisory Board is comprised of industry leaders with a vested interest in supporting the long term goals of the ADA organization. Advisory board members provide strategic guidance on matters such as operations, finances and partnerships.
Francis Ghesquiere
Practice Manager at The World Bank
Francis Ghesquiere is the Practice Manager for the World Bank East Asia and Pacific Region, where he supervises the portfolio of Urban Development and Disaster Risk Management for China, Mongolia, Vietnam and Philippines. He has been working for the World Bank since the year 2000, and is known for his leadership on several flagship initiatives, including the establishment of Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility (CCRIF), the Central America Probabilistic Risk Modeling Initiative, and the Understanding Risk Forum (UR). He was also key in the design of new policy instruments to help accelerate World Bank response to disasters, including the policy on emergency operations and innovative contingent financing instruments such as the CAT-DDO and Contingent Emergency Response Components. Mr. Ghesquiere was the Head of the Global Facility for Disaster Risk Management (GFDRR) until June 2018. He holds a Master Degree from the Harvard School of Government and an Engineering Degree from the University of Louvain. He also studied Finance and Economics at New York University, ESADE Barcelona and HEC Paris.
Kara Devonna Siahaan
Head of the Anticipation Hub
Kara is Head of the Anticipation Hub, an initiative of the German Red Cross, the International Federation Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) and the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre. The Hub brings together more than 90 partner organizations across the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement, universities, research institutes, NGOs, UN agencies, governments, donors, and network initiatives from 36 countries. Kara oversee management and develops strategic partnerships to facilitate learning, guidance, exchange and advocacy on anticipatory action. An Indonesian national, Kara has 15 years of experience in programme management, technical assistance, partnership and policy in the areas of humanitarian response, disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation. She co-led the innovative development of the first-ever global funding mechanism at IFRC that enables fast and systematic release of funds to implement early action based on weather forecasts to reduce the impacts of predictable disasters. Kara holds a Master´s degree in development studies from Technische Universität Darmstadt and Institut d’urbanisme de Grenobl
Nick Clark
Environment Editor
Nick Clark is AJE’s Environment Editor as well as being one of the channel’s senior anchors. A Royal Television Society Award winner, Nick has presented and reported from Afghanistan to Antarctica. He studied ocean science during a Fellowship at MIT in Boston and has drawn on that experience in his reporting on one of the most important stories of our times – the impacts of climate change. Nick’s most recent work away from the studio includes documentaries from Greenland and Eastern Europe. Past assignments include the drought in the Horn of Africa, the war in Libya and the ongoing human migration story in Europe. Nick previously worked for the BBC and ITV, with his formative journalism being in national newspapers.
Partners
