14 Sep
2006 - Hans Verolme has been appointed Director
of WWF’s Global Climate Change Programme. A Dutch
national, Hans comes to the position with extensive
experience of climate change issues and a thorough
knowledge of development challenges, having worked
across the globe and lived in India and Kenya.
These past nine years, Hans has resided in Washington,
DC, where he served for 5 years as senior adviser
to the British Embassy on environment and energy
policy before joining WWF US as head of their
climate change program.
"The challenges for the
climate are massive and rising,” said Verolme.
“The focus of my work will be to further prepare
WWF for the task at hand. That is quite a task
to be honest. We are seeing the impacts of climate
change on our conservation efforts and have gradually
increased efforts to strengthen our ability to
respond to those changes. We are now actively
engaged in some 20 countries in policy campaigns
with a focus on the energy sector. In addition
to our high-level lobbying we have built bridges
with the business community including through
strong performance based partnerships. We are
now looking ahead at what it will really take
from WWF for the world to stay below 2°C of
warming."
Hans succeeds Jennifer Morgan,
who has been seconded to Third Generational Environmentalism
(E3G) where she will lead the organization’s energy
and climate security work.
Hans Verolme can be contacted
at WWF US, Washington, D.C.
Read an interview with Jennifer
Morgan about her time with WWF and the future
of the climate debate.
