Advisory Committee of Climate Bridge Fund (ACCF) Members

Asif Saleh is the executive director of BRAC Bangladesh. He brings to this role diverse, multi-sectoral experience in senior leadership roles in the private, public and non-government sectors with a proven track record of effectively managing interfaces of development programming, operational and financial sustainability and building effective partnerships, both within and outside BRAC.

Prior to joining BRAC, Mr Saleh worked as a policy specialist for the Access to Information (A2i) Programme at the Prime Minister’s Office. He spent 12 years in Goldman Sachs in different fin-tech roles and institutional client sales in New York and London, ending his term there as an executive director. He has also worked at Glaxo Wellcome, IBM and Nortel.

Tushar Bhowmik, chief financial officer of BRAC, is an accomplished finance professional with over 20 years of progressive experience in strategic leadership, financial administration, corporate governance, risk management and internal control in the corporate arena of Bangladesh and UK.

Prior to joining BRAC, Mr Bhowmik worked as the regional finance director of Avery Dennison, South Asia. He also served in the functional head role in reputed local and multinational companies such as Zuellig Pharma Bangladesh, Rahimafrooz Storage Power Division, Transcom Group and Reckitt Benckiser, UK and Bangladesh.

Dr Md Liakath Ali is the director of the climate change programme at BRAC and BRAC International, and the urban development programme at BRAC.

Dr Ali has 32 years experience of working with various government, non-government, donor and UN agencies. He started his career with a private company in 1986, moving to Bangladesh Water Development Board (BWDB) in 1988. In 2008, he joined Dhaka Water Supply and Sewerage Authority (DWASA) as deputy managing director (RPD and O&M) and continued there until August 2011.

He was a climate change adaptation specialist in CDMP-II, UNDP in January 2012. In November 2012, he moved to DFID Bangladesh as the adviser for climate change and environment. Subsequently he joined WaterAid Bangladesh as the director of programme and policy advocacy and worked there until August 2019.

Ms Hasin Jahan is the country director of the Bangladesh country programme of WaterAid. Ms Jahan is a development professional with extensive experience in water, sanitation, hygiene, integrated waste management, energy and agricultural sectors.

She has progressive career which started with Local Government Engineering Department (LGED), and subsequently moved to Danish International Development Assistance (DANIDA), WSP, The World Bank deputed to ITN-BUET.

She worked as the Bangladesh country director of Practical Action. She is a TEDx speaker and a popular blog writer. She spends her spare time in advising start-ups to youngsters and serves as an International Board Member of WaterLinks, the Philippines.

Dr Saleemul Huq is the director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) at Independent University, Bangladesh (IUB) since 2009 and Senior Fellow at the International Institute for Environment & Development (IIED) in London. He is also Advisor of Climate Change Programme at BRAC.

Dr Huq was the director of the Climate Change Programme at IIED and founding executive director at the Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies (BCAS). He has worked extensively in the inter-linkages between climate change (both mitigation as well as adaptation) and sustainable development, from the perspective of the developing countries, with special emphasis on least developed countries (LDCs).

He has published numerous articles in scientific and popular journals. He was a lead author of the chapter on Adaptation and Sustainable Development in the third assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and was one of the coordinating lead authors of Inter-relationships between adaptation and mitigation in the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report (2007).

Dr Ainun Nishat is the adviser, Centre for Climate Change and Environmental Research (C3ER) BRAC University. He is the former vice-chancellor of BRAC University. He is engaged in carrying out diversified research projects in the field of climate change and. Previously, he served as the country representative, Bangladesh and later as the senior advisor climate change, Asia Region in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

He started his career as an assistant engineer at the Water Development Board, and later he joined BUET as a lecturer in 1972 in the Civil Engineering Department and become a professor in 1985. He has experience in working as a specialist in the ‘Master Plan for Construction of Multipurpose Cyclone Shelters in the Coastal Belt of Bangladesh’. He was the advisor for developing the coastal zone policy for Bangladesh.

Furthermore, Dr Nishat has conducted ample research on the Sundarbans during his tenure in IUCN. He is a key member of Climate Change Negotiation Team for Bangladesh. He was a key member of experts that prepared the National Adaptation Program of Action (NAPA-2005), Bangladesh Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan (BCCSAP-2008 & 2009) and also was one of the lead authors of Working Group-II of IPCC in preparation of the Third Assessment Report. He had been closely involved in the preparation of strategies and action plans such as the Bangladesh National Conservation Strategy, National Environment Management Action Plan, etc.

Ms. Haque has more than 12 years of experience of working in the space of international development, particularly focusing on crosscutting issues of gender, disability and social inclusion in Bangladesh. The array of her experience is quite diverse circulating around all the stages of project cycle management, starting from project designing to managing, implementing and monitoring, evaluation and learning, across a variety of sectors. Additionally, her academic exposure on gender at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), in addition to her major in economics and development studies in Bangladesh have moulded her paradigm and expanded her network to contextualise global knowledge to fit the local needs.

Ms. Haque is currently employed as a Portfolio Coordinator in the sector of climate resilient urban development at the German Development Bank (KfW) in Bangladesh. Prior to joining KfW, her work experiences include managing the portfolio in the German Development Cooperation, German Embassy Dhaka; and designing and managing projects in BRAC and Swisscontact. She has also worked as a freelance consultant for organisations such as European Union and Oxfam GB among others.