ENHG-AD Lecture: Abu Dhabi State of the Environment Report by Dr. Richard Perry

ENHG-AD Lecture: Abu Dhabi State of the Environment Report 2017, by Dr. Richard Perry

TIME: Refreshments from 7pm, AGM from 7.30pm, Lecture from 7.45pm 

VENUE: Salon 1, Park Hyatt Abu Dhabi Hotel and Villas, Saadiyat Island, Abu Dhabi

AGM: The Annual General Meeting of the ENHG-AD will  be held before this lecture, starting at 7:30 PM. 
This approximately 20-minute AGM will consist of the Treasurer’s and Chairman’s presentations reviewing the finances and activities of the Abu Dhabi chapter of the ENHG from Sept 2016 through Aug 2017. As always, the AGM is open to all to the general public, but only paid-up members will be invited to vote on the ratification of ENHG-AD Committee officers/members. 

About our speaker:

Dr Richard Perry first came to Abu Dhabi in 1999 to establish the Protected Areas Management, GIS, and Industrial Permitting functions of the Environment Agency – Abu Dhabi (EAD), or ERWDA as it was known then.

He left Abu Dhabi in 2004 to go and work in the Australian Mallee as biodiversity manager with the Mallee Catchment Authority. Returning to Abu Dhabi in 2006 at the request of Abu Dhabi Company for Onshore Oil Operations (ADCO), where he worked for a couple of years before joining Masdar as Environment and Sustainability Manager. The current Secretary General of the Environment Agency asked him to return to the Environment Agency in 2010 to head up the Environment Vision 2030 project, and he has been there ever since.​

Richard was vice-chair of the ENHG some 15 yrs ago, and has previously given talks to the ENHG on the “Abu Dhabi Coastal Sensitivity Atlas” and “Environment Vision 2030”, both projects that he managed on behalf of EAD.

Richard is a zoologist by training with a doctorate in “Evolutionary Population Dynamics”, although these days he is more involved in organisational development at the Agency. He is an advisor in the Secretary General’s Office and chairman of the research and technical committee.

His latest presentation to the ENHG will cover the “Abu Dhabi State of Environment Report 2017”, for which he was project manager. The “AD-SoER 2017” took around 18 months to compile and involved teams of experts from within the Agency, as well as input from external experts and reviewers.  Richard will describe the process undertaken, some of the findings and some of the lessons learnt. He is keen to receive feedback on the report so that improvements can be made, and is particularly eager to hear from anyone who might be willing to help contribute to the next iteration in a couple of years.

Richard is a keen advocate of citizen science and would welcome ideas and contributions from members of the group.