TEDxAddis - Negusu Aklilu - Is A Green Ethiopia Possible?

Negusu Aklilu is Director of the Forum for Environment in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He has been working as an environmental campaigner for the last 15 years and has played a leading role in advocating for environmental rights in Ethiopia and beyond. He led some successful campaigns at home and two campaigns in the run-up to the Copenhagen Climate Conference in 2010. One is the African Climate Appeal, a politico-moral appeal by key African environmental activists initiated by Nobel Laureate Wangari Maathai. The other campaign, ³America, Take the Lead Now², produced a petition signed by about 2 million Ethiopians to the US government.
Currently, Negusu co-chairs the Ethiopian Civil Society Network on ClimateChange (ECSNCC), comprising about 60 organizations. He is a representative of civil society organizations in Ethiopia¹s National Environment Council. He has authored a number of articles on a range of environmental issues and serves as editor of Akirma, a local environmental magazine, as well as co-editor of the Ethiopian Environment Review.
Some of his other initiatives in Ethiopia include the national Green Award Program, the annual Ethiopian Environment Review, and the new local Green Tax initiative.
Currently, he serves as a co-chair of the UNEP Major Groups and StakeholdersAdvisory Group on International Environmental Governance, which has been providing inputs for the Rio+20 process.
He was voted one of the 25 most influential Ethiopians in 2009/2010 by Addis Neger, Ethiopian newspaper. In the same year, he was voted as one of the 13 emerging global environmental leaders by the Global Environmental Governance Program that was then hosted by the College of William and Mary and Yale University.
He is trained in biology and ecology and later in Environmental Diplomacy ata UNEP/University of Geneva post-graduate course.
Negusu was named Yale World Fellow in June 2011.