What does it take to become a UN humanitarian work?

We interviewed Hovig Etyemezian, Head of Innovation at UNHCR, the UN Agency for Refugees to find out about his journey and how working in the field, in the frontlines, managing refugee camps logistics, finding ways to innovate in volatile situations teaches one to be agile and resilient, qualities he brings to his role as Head of Innovation at the UNHCR in Geneva.

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Interview with Mark Manly, head of donor relations and resource mobilisation at the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

The UNHCR focuses on providing international protection and solutions for refugees, internally displaced people, and preventing statelessness. Their fundraising strategy relies on flexible annual funding from government donors and increasingly from the private sector, including individual donations and corporate contributions.

The organization has a presence in 140 countries and emphasizes integrating refugees into national programs when they cannot return to their homes due to continued conflict.

UNHCR aimed to raise $1 billion from private donors by 2025, surpassing this goal in 2022 due to the Ukraine crisis. They continue to highlight overlooked emergencies like Sudan to secure ongoing support.

We spoke about the demonization of immigrants and refugees by the hard-right pundits and how the news media can be an ally to counter misinformation and fake news.

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Seeking Common Ground in a World of Rivalry

The organization led by Justin Vaisse, historian and diplomat, is supported by the French government and private sector sponsors, including Microsoft.

There will be panels with AI companies and how they are engaging with governments, academics, and UN officials from Africa and Europe.

Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith will be speaking on using AI in the humanitarian field, and their multiple partnerships with UN agencies in the areas of advanced disaster monitoring systems, and education projects with UNICEF, including the Learning Passport, and other digital literacy programs.

The Learning Passport is a Cambridge University-designed initiative launched with Microsoft’s support to ensure forcibly displaced children and young people can continue their education in their native languages, and not miss the school year due to war or civil conflicts that might take years to resolve, as they will need to temporarily settle in the host countries.

Microsoft is also working with Least Developed Countries and supporting the achievement of the SDGs targets by partnering with the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR).

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Watch my interview with Paris Peace Forum founder Justin Vaïsse, to find out more.

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I interviewed Bourhan Yassin, CEO of Rainforest Connection, a company that applies AI to acoustics for data insights to better inform conservation, preserve biodiversity, and protect the rainforests from illegal logging. They are currently working in 80 countries, including Brazil, where most of their work is happening.

RFCx works with audio to monitor species of wild birds for instance, to analyse the sounds of the Brazilian Amazon Rainforest, and works with indigenous communities to help them identify illegal logging, and to catalogue species to protect biodiversity.

They use satellites developed by Swarm, that operates ultra-small satellites for IOT devices, a company that was acquired by SpaceX in 2021.

We spoke about their projects in Brazil and how they are funded, and how Google.org supports their work alongside other philanthropic organizations.

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Interview with Brazilian Diplomat Camila Olsen on Promoting Brazil Abroad and Attracting FDI

Interview with Camila Olsen, Head of Trade, Investment, Agriculture and Energy Section at the Brazilian Embassy in Copenhagen

Today I interviewed the Brazilian diplomat Camila Olsen, head of trade investment, agriculture and energy at the Brazilian embassy in Copenhagen, Denmark, where she oversees a portfolio of trade in agriculture, we also spoke about Foreign Direct Investment in Brazil, and how they are bringing the most relevant stakeholders to the table: academia, private and public sectors at the Embassy of Brazil and Denmark, in the division she works, which is promoting trade.

We spoke about trading commodities, Brazil's competitive advantage given its climate, and how it trades with the global south as a tropical country exporter of goods that cannot be farmed, or produced anywhere else.

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UN Secretary General Calls for a Global AI Regulatory Agency

These last couple of days have been quite busy on issues of AI and emerging tech governance at the UN and its agencies. We had the IGF meeting in Geneva with Maria Ressa and Vint Cerf, AI at the Security Council in New York, and the UN Human Rights High Commissioner Volker Turk calling also for a study on the impacts of new technologies and the possible creation of a Special Rapporteur on Tech is being floated.

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“We need a learner’s mindset”, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres on AI regulation and global governance for its impact on society and security.

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The UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights and many other international human rights treaties state that the right to housing under international human rights law is the right to live in peace, security and dignity.

The violation of the right to housing is often experienced by marginalized and disadvantaged groups including indigenous peoples, persons with disabilities, ethnic and religious minority communities, people of color, migrants and refugees, women, single mothers, and LGBTQ+ persons.

I spoke with Leilani Farha, former UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Housing and Global Director of The Shift. Her organization works with parliaments, and civil society actors on the principle that housing is a social good. We also spoke of her work with the Norwegian Refugee Council, and the aggravated housing situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and even more so now, in the Gaza Strip.

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Getting things done at COP28: Watch my interview with the European Space Agency Director-General Josef Aschbacher where we do a 360 degree on climate action and ESA

Interview with the ESA Director-General Josef Aschbacher

Space travel is the stuff of dreams for most of us. I have dreamed of space missions since I organized a press briefing at the engineering department of Florida International University, featuring a former NASA astronaut, Dr. Bernard Harris, who came to speak to young high-school students at FIU‘s Summer program, in 2007.

I was taking a break from journalism, but followed around Jose Pagliery, one of the reporters that attended the press briefing, who was then with the Miami Herald (now with The Daily Beast) as he interviewed Harris on what was like to see the Earth from space, wear a clunky space suit, and why younger generations should care.

While most of us will never circumvent the Earth from space, at least in these coming decades, we nevertheless use devices everyday and trust our weather forecasters with the recommendation of whether we should wear our rain boots over the weekend, using information that is gathered by satellites. About 80% of the information we rely on comes from space satellites, including ESA and other providers.

This week I interviewed the European Space Agency Director General, Josef Aschbacher, on his participation at COP28 and what is in store for 2024, from developing next generation satellites with Airbus to working with the United Nations Environment Program, to creating a coalition to address space debris when decommissioning satellites no longer operational, to pledging during COP28, alongside other heads of space agencies, to further support climate action.

It was the first time that a dedicated Space Pavilion was created at a COP and the panels and meetings centered and focused on how space research can promote further understanding of global warming.

Mr. Aschbacher is a scientist, and rose through the ranks at the European Space Agency, so knows the subject inside and out. We had a long conversation on the next generation of satellites, international cooperation, working alongside NASA and other space agencies, and how space technologies will help us better understand the Brazilian Amazon Rainforest ecosystem. These past days he has signed agreements to work with UNEP and the European Commission Directorate General for Climate Action, and is currently hammering out a program with the Brazilian Space Agency.

We also spoke about the number of satellites in orbit (a total of 8K of which 5K are from a private sector provider, Starlink, Elon Musk’s satellite company) and how to manage this increasing number, and his invitation to Elon Musk, and other heads of space agencies, to join the coalition that will pledge to address debris and to decommission satellites in a manner that will avoid further polluting space, as we try to understand our planet, our galaxy, and beyond.

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