Dr. Oommen V. Oommen is an eminent biodiversity conservationist with several years of experience as a teacher, scientist and a policy maker. He has more than 40 years of teaching experience. He was Dean, Faculty of Science, Professor and Head, Department of Zoology, University of Kerala, India and CSIR Emeritus scientist. He served as Chairman of Kerala State Biodiversity Board and during this period he had been responsible for bringingabout policy decisions to enable the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. As recognition of his outstanding research contribution in caecilian biology and molecular taxonomy, Scientists from Natural History Museum, London has named a caecilian amphibian, Uraeotyphlus oommeni, in his honour. He has published over 170 research papers, 15 book chapters, 20 Gen Bank submissions, edited four international books in the last seven years and published several popular science articles.Dr Laladhas K P is the former Principal at St Stephen’s College, Pathanapuran, Kollam, Kerala is an eminent academician and researcher in various disciplines of life science. He has 26 years of meritorious academic service in higher education teaching. His areas of research are conservation of biodiversity, bio-prospecting, molecular characterization and biological assays. He has completed different major and minor research projects funded by the Department of Science & Technology, the Government of India and the University Grants commission. He has also worked on consultancy projects funded by the UNDP and National Medicinal Plant Board.Three International Books have been edited; one book was published by Springer International and two by Bentham Publishers. More than sixty-five research publications were published in peer-reviewed International and National Journals. He has also authored seven books in the area of Environment & Biodiversity and been published by National Publishers. He served Kerala State Biodiversity Board as its Member Secretary for more than five years. His expertise has been registered in the academic and administrative committees of different Universities in Kerala. He has also functioned as an Expert member in the different policy-making committees of the National Biodiversity Authority, Government of India and Government of Kerala. He has also worked as an expert member of Kerala Coastal Zone Management Authority, Ministry of Environment and Forest, Government of India, and Member of the working group on Biodiversity constituted by Kerala State Planning Board for the 13th Five-year plan.Dr. Prakash Nelliyat is a Key Expert (Economist) in the Monitoring and Evaluation team of the World Bank sponsored Tamil Nadu Irrigated Agricultural Modernization (TNIAM) Project at Centre for Water Resources, Anna University Chennai. Previously he worked as Subject Expert (Economic Valuation of Tradable Bio-resources in Kerala) in the Rebuild Kerala Inetiative Programme at the Kerala State Biodiversity Board; Consultant (Biodiversity Finance Initiative) at the UNDP; Fellow, Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS), at the Centre for Biodiversity Policy and Law, Chennai, where he involved in research on various issues on ABS. He also worked as Environmental Economist (valuation of biological resources) at the National Biodiversity Authority; Research Coordinator for ‘South Asian Integrated Water Resources Management Programme’ at the Centre for Water Resources - Anna University; and as ‘Research Associate’ at Madras School of Economics and Madras Institute of Development Studies. Prakash has more than 25 years research and teaching experience in Water Resources Issues, Environmental Economics, Biodiversity and Natural Resources Management and received IWMI-TATA Water Policy Research Program’s Young Scientist Award, 2006. Prakash received the World Bank Aided India Capacity Building project (Environmental Economics) Overseas Fellowship (2002) and carried out research at the Department of Water and Environmental Studies, Linkoping University, Sweden. He presented number of papers on water/biodiversity and other natural resources / environmental issues in national and international conferences and also published articles in reputed journals and edited books. After the Post-graduation (M.A. Economics), Prakash undergone interdisciplinary training in Environment and Natural Resources Economics and obtained M.Phil from Centre for Research on New International Economic Order, Chennai – University of Madras - and Ph.D from Madras School of Economics – University of Madras. His M.Phil thesis on ‘Coconut Husk Retting and its Environmental Problems in Coastal Kerala’ and Ph.D dissertation on ‘Industrial Growth and Environmental Degradation: A Case Study of Industrial Pollution in Tiruppur’.Dr. Balakrishna Pisupati is an internationally renowned conservation and development specialist with close to three decades of experience working at national, regional and international levels, holding positions such as the Chairperson of FLEDGE, an international think tank, Vice-Chancellor, TransDisciplinary University (TDU, India), Chief of Biodiversity, Land Law and Governance programmes at United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP, Kenya), Senior Policy Fellow at Fridtjof Nansen Institute (FNI, Norway), Chairman, National Biodiversity Authority-Government of India (NBA, India), Coordinator, Biodiplomacy Programme at United Nations University (UNU-IAS, Japan), Head, Regional Biodiversity Programme for Asia at the World Conservation Union (IUCN, Sri Lanka), Head, Biodiversity and Biotechnology programme at the M S Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF, India). He is currently managing International Environmental Governance issues at the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Law Division where he leads issues related to science policy interface. He also served as the Regional Vice Chair for South and Southeast Asia at IUCN Commission on Education and Communication, Global Chair for IUCN Specialist Group on Traditional Knowledge and Community Engagement. He has advised more than 50 countries on conservation and development policy and served as advisor to international bodies such as China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development, China, the Global Environment Facility (GEF), World Bank, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and others.
