Director of Environmental Law Program at University of Maryland. Founding member of the IUCN Academy of Environmental Law. Internationally recognized scholar and teacher in environmental law and the principal author of the most widely used environmental law casebooks. He has worked with China's Supreme People's Court, the National People's Congress, and the Chinese Ministry of Environmental Protection.
He will be talking about cooperation between China and the US on climate issues and the competition on rare earth metals.
Professor of political science and development studies at Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, the most important public university in Bolivia. 2008 Yale World Fellow. Franco has also dedicated himself to the democratization of Bolivia's political system through positions with the Ministry of the Presidency, the mayor of La Paz, and Bolivia's Constitutional Assembly. He also was consultant of the High Court of Electoral Affairs, and helped negotiate political agreements for Constitutional Assembly when Franco was appointed as UNDP representative between 2006 and 2007.
He will be talking about the geopolitics of the lithium economy in the triangle of exploitation between Bolivia, Argentina and China's investments.
Associate Director of Center for Biodiversity and Conservation at American Museum of Natural History. Adjunct research scientist at Columbia University and the Americas Coordinator of the IUCN Flamingo Specialist Group. She has over 25 years of experience working on site-based and regional conservation initiatives in Latin America. She will be talking about the impact of lithium mining on flamingo habitats in South America, with a focus on Argentina.
Associate Professor at Tsinghua University, Division of Environmental Ecology. His work focuses on material metabolism and circular economy and sustainability of using metal resources. He will be presenting on the material flow analysis and circular economy of critical metals with a focus on cobalt.
African Editor at China Dialogue. He advises multiple organizations on their engagement with Chinese overseas investments. He works in the intersections between journalism and the NGO world and the environmental impacts of Belt and Road projects. His work has appeared in The Economist, South China Morning Post, and elsewhere. He holds an MA in History from the University of Glasgow and lived and worked in Beijing for a decade. He will be talking about the rise of industrial policy in the global south related to critical metals.
Moderator
Tessa is a second Year Master of Environmental Science Student at the Yale School of Environment. Her research focus is the critical materials used in the energy transition and the recycling of solar panels and wind turbines. She has 4 years' professional experience as a waste and resources consultant and a bachelor's degree in Natural Science from the University of Cambridge.
Director of Center for Transnational Environmental Accountability. 2008 Yale World Fellow. Zhang is a renowned Chinese environmental lawyer. Through her work as the first litigation director with the Beijing-based Center for Legal Assistance to Pollution Victims between 1999 and 2008, Zhang won several milestone environmental litigation cases in the Chinese courts, and was called China's Erin Brockovich. She is now working on cutting-edge transnational environmental lawsuits on Chinese companies' environmental and human rights performances in Africa and Latin America.
Executive director of Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association (ZELA). He has over 20 years of experience in conducting research aimed at influencing legal, policy and institutional reforms related to natural resources governance. He will be talking about how to strengthen regulations on the environmental impacts of Chinese investments in Zimbabwe.
Fellow at NYU US Asia Law Institute. He has directed US Senate investigations and hearings on US government energy and environmental management, and was UNDP's "foreign expert advisor" on China environmental law. As a lawyer, he has represented cities, states, citizens, and workers in energy, environmental, antimonopoly, human rights, and anti-corruption litigation. He has been a visiting professor at several renowned universities in China, including Peking University and Tsinghua University. In the US, he taught for many years at Johns Hopkins University.
Founding Partner of Greenment Investment and the Board Director of the Jane Goodall Institute-Shanghai. Former managing director of ERM China. He has over 30 years of experience in strategic consulting for multinational companies and governments in the fields of sustainable development, risk management, and corporate social responsibility. Dr. Wang will be talking about case studies of Simandou iron ore in Guinea and ESG solutions for Chinese mining companies.
Moderator
Assistant Professor of Environmental Policy and Governance at Yale School of the Environment. His work focuses on environmental policymaking–especially how political institutions mediate the relationship between the environmental preferences of constituents and the incentives and actions of policymakers. His work has appeared in Nature Sustainability Environmental Research Letters, Natural Resources Forum, Water Resources Development, and the American Journal of Political Science. Dr. Sanford has had teaching experiences in China.
Kroon 319
Financial, Legal and Technological Strategies for Sustainable Mining Investments
This session will explore ways to integrate strategies of different fields to encourage compliance with regulations on mining activities. We will discuss innovative solutions to minimize social and environmental impacts of mining investment in developing countries.
Discussion Leads
Kroon 321
Community Engagement and Empowerment
This session will discuss best practices to improve local livelihoods with sustainable mining activities, including participatory decision-making, capacity building, and support for local economic development. The session will also examine the role of government, civil society, and private sector actors in promoting investment activities that are mutually beneficial for all stakeholders.
Discussion Leads
Hong is a wildlife conservation activist and the founder and CEO of China House, a social enterprise that works closely with global research institutions, NGOs, and private enterprises on research, conservation, education, and development projects, making an impact over 27 countries across 4 continents. Hong holds an MPA in development practice from Columbia University. He was featured in in the Oscar-shortlisted Netflix documentary, the Ivory Game. In 2018, Hong received Forbes China "30 Under 30" in the social enterprise category.
Hong will be sharing his experiences of improving livelihoods of local communities and engaging Chinese communities into conservation work in Latin America.
Zhao Zhong is the founder and director of Green Camel Bell, a grass-root environmental NGO in Northwest China. At the local level, he conducts a range of programs and projects focusing on environmental education, water pollution monitoring, and community-based eco-agriculture and sustainable development. At the national level, he promotes and researches public participation in environmental decision-making and provides training and mentorship to grassroots partners. At the global level, he bridges Chinese overseas energy and forest investors and impacted communities of host countries promoting responsible green investment.
