• Prof. Costanza Robert (Tuesday 31 May, 10:30)

• Dr. Choe Jae Chun (Tuesday 31 May, 10:50)

• Dr. Kim Chong-Chun (Wednesday 1 June, 09:00)

• Dr. Leimona Beria (Wednesday 1 June, 09:30)

• Karki Madhav B., Ph.D. (Friday 3 June, 14:00)

Biographies

'Applying ecosystem services concepts for managing landscapes in Asia and the Pacific'

Professor Costanza Robert is a Chair in Public Policy at Crawford School of Public Policy. Prior to this, he was Distinguished University Professor of Sustainability, in the Institute for Sustainable Solutions at Portland State University. Before moving to PSU in Sept. 2010, he was the Gund Professor of Ecological Economics and founding director of the Gund Institute for Ecological Economics at the University of Vermont. Before Vermont, he was on the faculty at Maryland and LSU, a visiting scientist at the Beijer Institute in Sweden, and at the Illinois Natural History Survey. Dr. Costanza is also currently a Senior Fellow at the National Council on Science and the Environment, Washington, DC, and a Senior Fellow at the Stockholm Resilience Center, Stockholm, Sweden, and an Affiliate Fellow at the Gund Institute for Ecological Economics at the University of Vermont, a deTao Master of Ecological Economics at the deTao Masters Academy, Shanghai, China, and co-chair of the Ecosystem Services Partnership Professor Costanza received his Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering Sciences (Systems Ecology with Economics minor) from the University of Florida. Professor Costanza’s transdisciplinary research integrates the study of humans and the rest of nature to address research, policy and management issues at multiple time and space scales, from small watersheds to the global system. He is co-founder and past-president of the International Society for Ecological Economics, and was chief editor of the society’s journal, Ecological Economics from its inception in 1989 until 2002. He currently serves on the editorial board of ten other international academic journals. He is also co-editor in chief of Solutions (www.thesolutionsjournal.org), with Ida Kubiszewski, a unique hybrid academic/popular journal. His awards include a Kellogg National Fellowship, the Society for Conservation Biology Distinguished Achievement Award, a Pew Scholarship in Conservation and the Environment, the Kenneth Boulding Memorial Award for Outstanding Contributions in Ecological Economics, and honorary doctorates from Stockholm University and the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon. Professor Costanza is the author or co-author of over 500 scientific papers and 27 books. His work has been cited in more than 19,000 scientific articles in ISI and he has been named as one of ISI’s Highly Cited Researchers since 2004. More than 300 interviews and reports on his work have appeared in various popular media. His specialties include: transdisciplinary integration, systems ecology, ecological economics, landscape ecology, ecological modeling, ecological design, energy analysis, environmental policy, social traps, incentive structures and institutions.

'The ‘Unsparingly’ Giving Nature and How to Appreciate Its Services'

Dr. Choe Jae Chun received his PhD in evolutionary biology from Harvard University under the guidance of Professors Bert Hölldobler and Edward O. Wilson. Before returning to Korea in 1994, he worked at Harvard University as full-time lecturer, the University of Michigan as assistant professor, and Junior Fellow at the Michigan Society of Fellows. Between 1994 and 2006 he was a professor of biological sciences at Seoul National University. In 2006 he moved to Ewha University as University Chair Professor and the Director of the University's Natural History Museum. Since November 2013 he serves as the founding director of a newly established National Institute of Ecology in Korea. In 2013 he also has established The Biodiversity Foundation with Jane Goodall. On behalf of Minister Yoon Seong-kyu, Jae Chun Choe has been serving as alternate chair of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) since 12 October 2014. 

He is an associate editor of Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology and on editorial board of Evolutionary Psychology, Ecological Research, Journal of Ethology, and Journal of Insect Behavior. He also served as the editor for the invertebrate social behavior section in the Encyclopedia of Animal Behavior (2011). He has published more than 100 scientific papers, 6 books in English, and written or translated more than 40 books. He was the president of Ecological Society of Korea (2007-2008) and is now the Co-President of the Climate Change Center and the member of the board directors of the biodiversity foundation. He is also the alternative chair on UN Convention on Biological Diversity for 2014-2016.

'Coexistence between People and Nature based on Enhancement of Ecosystem Services'

Dr. Kim Chong-Chun is currently Executive Director of Korea National Park Service (KNPS), an affiliated organization of the Ministry of Environment (MOE) in Korea. Before joining KNPS, he has served the Korean government for more than 30 years since he passed the state examination for higher government officials in 1978. 

Dr. Kim was a President of National Institute of Biological Resources (NIBR), the major institution for research and education of biological resources. He is also recognized as an expert of sustainable development by serving as a Director General for National Projects at the Presidential Commission on Sustainable Development in 2006. He played a crucial role in making the very first National Sustainable Development Strategy (NSDS) in Asia-Pacific region.

While as a counselor for environmental affairs of Korean Embassy to Kenya, he was involved in crucial policies and decision making of both UNEP and UN-Habitat as a deputy permanent representative to two international organizations. He, as Director General for International Cooperation Bureau of MOE, concluded the MOU on Knowledge (Sharing) Partnership with the World Bank in 2001, on the basis of which he initiated to share and distribute Korea’s environmental policy experiences in Asian developing countries. More recently, he successfully exercised close and efficient partnership with related agencies both at home and abroad, and showed commitments and leadership for the 2012 IUCN World Conservation Congress held in Jeju, Korea as the Secretary General for the Korean Organizing Committee.