On April 26th, 2023, an online webinar on climate governance in Southeast Asia will be held from 10:00 to 11:30 GMT+2 or 16:00 to 17:30 GMT+8, in partnership with The Indo-Pacific Circle.
Southeast Asia is one of the most climate-vulnerable regions of the world. At the same time, the region’s greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) have grown in recent years – attributed to land use change and fossil fuel-dependent economies. Yet it is important to acknowledge that the countries of the region are at different levels of development with varying climate vulnerabilities; and have differentiated requirements when it comes to climate mitigation and adaptation. Countries in the region have been focusing on promoting context-specific adaptation and climate-resilient development strategies to deal with the adverse climate impacts (including on water security) and simultaneously reducing carbon emissions. They have also been cooperating with each other through regional organizations such as the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and with international, multilateral climate governance and policy mechanisms. However, the region faces several challenges in climate governance – ranging from financial and capacity to institutional and policy.
Against this background, this event will feature presentations by three experts, and will offer an analysis of climate change-related governance architectures and case study-based insights in Southeast Asia. This webinar will also cover issues of justice and equity in the context of regional and global climate governance. The presentations will be followed by an open discussion and Q&A with the online participants. The discussions will be moderated by Dr Dhanasree Jayaram.
This event is part of the South-South webinar series and follows the first webinar, the launch of the book ‘Environmental Governance in Indonesia’, which was organized in March.
Speakers
Helena Varkkey
Maitreyee Mukherjee
Shofwan Choiruzzad
Moderator
Dhanasree Jayaram
Dr. Maitreyee Mukherjee: Moitre is an inter–disciplinary policy scholar, with research interests in environmental governance, climate change policies, and water resources management. She holds a PhD in Public Policy (National University of Singapore, NUS) and Masters in Environmental Management (NUS).
With nearly 8 years of experience in water policy research, her work broadly explores implications of governance tools in designing policy portfolio for drought mitigation, climate change adaptation and urban water security. During the webinar, Moitre will speak about challenges and opportunities in water resource management in response to climate adaptation in Southeast Asia.
Dr Helena Varkkey is an Associate Professor of Environmental Politics at the Department of International and Strategic Studies, Universiti Malaya. Her areas of expertise include transboundary haze governance in Southeast Asia and global palm oil politics. Her monograph on “The Haze Problem in Southeast Asia: Palm Oil and Politics” was published by Routledge in 2016. Her presentation as part of this event will be on Peatland Governance and Climate Change in ASEAN
Shofwan Al Banna Choiruzzad is an Associate Professor at the Department of International Relations, Universitas Indonesia. He also serves as the Executive Secretary of the university’s ASEAN Studies Center. His research interests are issues on the nexus between ‘the global’ and ‘the local,’ including in foreign policy analysis, palm oil political economy, regionalism, and anthropocentrization. Shofwan’s presentation will be on “How Green Can You Go: Anticipating the Social and Political Risks of Green Transition Discourse in Indonesia”.
