In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized (subject to certain rules and regulations).

Islamabad
Islamabad
Islamabad, Islamabad, 44000
Pakistan

Aamir Majeed

Aamir Majeed is an entrepreneur and technology enthusiast with a special interest in developing technologies to counter climate change. Aamir holds a degree in Aeronautical Engineering from NUST (College of Aeronautical Engineering) and has vast experience of developing drones for commercial applications. He has landed multiple funding from national & International innovation funds including MIT Sandbox for developing drone solutions in Agriculture. Aamir’s latest venture is ForresOn; an Islamabad based technology startup planting trees using drones & AI. ForresOn is aiming to plant millions of trees in Pakistan using its fleet of autonomous drones that can plant seeds, monitor growth and analyze health of a forest using AI; and help counter the worsening effects of Climate Change on our beautiful homeland.

Afia Salam

Afia Salam is a career journalist having 4 decades of experience of print, electronic and web journalism. She was Pakistan’s first female cricket journalist and served in the first batch of female Air Traffic Controllers. She also has 15 years of experience in the advertising industry as the creative head. She is a LEAD, FNF's International Academy of Leadership & Australia Awards Fellow, member of IUCN Commission on Education & Communications and Commission on Economic & Social Policy. As a development practitioner, she is currently President of Baanhn Beli and Vice President Salman Sufi Foundation, and Chair Board of Trustees Indus Earth Trust She is actively engaged in Climate Change policy advocacy and activism through her writings and talks at various forums and on media, plus training and teaching of students and journalists.

Kashmala Kakakhel

Kashmala Kakakhel has over 14 years of experience of working with governments and development partners in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Malawi, Kenya, Mexico, Myanmar, Nepal and Pakistan. Her core competence lies in international policy on climate finance – ensuring it is in line with the needs and requirements of the developing countries, and works with developing countries to design projects for which funding can be secured from international climate funds. Since 2016, Kashmala is the official Advisor to Pakistan’s representative to the Board of the Green Climate Fund. For 2020, she served as the Lead Co-Chair Advisor as Pakistan was elected Co-Chair to the Board to represent over 130 countries of developing countries. She supported the successful conclusion of the term by approving 37 projects in over 40 countries, worth US$ 2.1billion. Kashmala also led the negotiations to update the Fund’s Strategic Plan, approved in November 2020. This plan will aid the Fund in programming US$ 8 billion over the next 3 years. During her role as the Country Programme Manager of Climate Development and Knowledge Network (CDKN), a programme of DFID UK from 2010 - 2015, she led the development of the South Asian component of the £60 million CDKN Strategy and Business Plan 2011-15, focusing on the procurement, policy measures and plans of action required to build local capacity for tackling climate change. Also led the development of the proposal for the successful £40 million extension of the CDKN programme for 2015-17 for Pakistan and Bangladesh. Kashmala directly procured and managed 13 different technical assistance and research projects under CDKN’s Asia strategy worth £10.5 million including 2 in Nepal, 6 in Bangladesh, 4 in Pakistan and 1 in India. These included: supporting the Government of Bangladesh in to access international climate finance; supporting the Governments of Pakistan and Bangladesh to undertake sectoral research to feed into the Nationally Determined Contributions as submissions for the Paris Agreement in 2015; coordinating the development of a Risk Insurance Fund in Pakistan to target more than 20 million individuals at risk from climate change impacts; managing a consortium of four organisations that technically assisted the group of 48 Least Developed Countries (LDCs) to successfully articulate a negotiation position on Loss and Damage from climate change which lead to the UN Warsaw International Mechanism on Loss and Damage As an independent consultant, Kashmala has developed a disaster risk insurance product for agriculture and livestock for the microfinance industry in Pakistan, prepared a Disaster Risk Financing strategy to support the operations of the USD 300 million ADB funded National Disaster Risk Management Fund in Pakistan. As external Advisor to McKinsey she was responsible for developing a country level approach to disaster resilience in Pakistan. She also undertook the first critical assessment of the procurement policies of the Green Climate Fund, identifying corruption risks at the national level in Kenya and Mexico. Kashmala also designed National Climate Change Adaptation plans in Afghanistan, Myanmar, Malawi, and Nepal Kashmala has authored a comprehensive research paper on how to quantify economic and non-economic loss and damage from climate change and its potential policy implications on climate finance. Findings have been included in a UNEP report ‘Loss and Damage: The Role of Ecosystem Services’ published May 2016. The paper is also included as a key resource by a UN Technology Mechanism, citing it as the first study of its kind on the global debate around the issue, supplemented with field data and analysis from Pakistan. She has served as Board member of the Climate Action Network from 2015 – 2017, the strongest policy advocacy network of over 1300 organisations. Kashmala writes opinion pieces for national and international news agencies, and is also a TEDx speaker. Kashmala supported the development of key policies on green growth and poverty reduction for PTI’s Party Manifesto, in conjunction with senior party leadership. She now supports the government in delivering on its reform agenda.

Malik Amin Aslam

Malik Amin Aslam is currently the Prime Minister’s Special Assistant on Climate Change (Federal Minister) as well as honorarily serving as the elected Global Vice President of IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature). He has previously chaired the flagship “Green Growth initiative” for the KPK in Pakistan – which included the mass a forestation “Billion Tree Tsunami” project. From 2002-07 he has served as a Member of Parliament and from 2004-07 as the Minister of State for Environment (Government of Pakistan) and, in this capacity, has been the architect of the country’s National Policies on environment and climate change. During this period Malik Amin Aslam, worked as the Prime Minister’s special envoy for reform of the UN governance system. Malik Amin Aslam has also had the privilege of chairing the G77+China negotiations group and leading Pakistan’s climate change negotiations at various COP meeting since 1999. He has recently been chosen to serve on the high level “International Advisory Council” for the Eco-Forum Global – the leading environmental think-tank advising the Government of China. Mr. Malik is an electrical engineer with an MBA from McGill University and an MSc from Oxford University where he completed his thesis on the utility of the “emissions trading” concept within the context of managing the Climate Change issue.