Claire Bertschinger,
lecturer at the London School of Tropical Medicine

Claire Bertschinger organises and runs the Diploma in Tropical Nursing at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She is a registered nurse and has a Masters Degree in Medical Anthropology.

She has lived and worked in Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Panama, Sierra Leone, Switzerland, Sulawesi, Uganda and elsewhere.

Dr Elizabeth Breeze,
specialist in Population and Ageing

Dr Breeze has been involved in the demographic aspects of environmental sustainability since the 1960s.  She joined the Population Working Group of the then Conservation Society in about 1973. That group was one of the first to focus on population numbers as a key cause of environmental degradation.   

In 1974-5 she took the Diploma in Population Growth and Development at University College Cardiff.  Working on health surveys led her to take an MSc in Epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

During the next 10 years most of her work at LSHTM was on health inequalities among the older members of the UK population and this formed the topic of her PhD.  

Dr Breeze currently works on the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing at University College London. She has a particular interest in the positive contribution of older people to society.

Ike Ezekwe,
President of the African Foundation for Development (AFPODEV), Nigeria

Ike Ezekwe is a lawyer with ten years of experience, most of which have been devoted to human rights activism and defence of the poor, oppressed and vulnerable.  He is the founder and president of AFPODEV, based on his conviction that we cannot achieve the sustainable development of African societies without addressing the population issue.

He is also the chair of Population Support Group (PSG) – a network of NGOs/CSOs working on population in Nigeria.  Additionally he coordinates the Civil Society Coalition on the Nigerian population census.

Professor Sir Andrew Haines,
Director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Sir Andy is Director of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine since 2001, having previously been Professor of Primary Health Care and Director of the Department of Primary Care and Population Sciences, Royal Free and University College Medical School.

He was the Director of Research & Development at the NHS Executive, North Thames, and has also worked internationally in Nepal, Jamaica, Canada and the USA.

His research interests are in epidemiology and health services research focusing particularly on research in primary care and the study of environmental influences on health, including the potential effects of global environmental change.

Professor Aubrey Manning OBE,
distinguished zoologist and broadcaster recently retired from the Chair of Natural History, University of Edinburgh. 

Aubrey Manning is currently President of the Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts.

His wide range of television broadcasts have included: the BBC Two's Earth Story and Talking Landscapes. He is currently working on a new series called The Rules of Life for the BBC Radio 4 and the Open University.

Aubrey Manning is also a specialist in animal behaviour. His An Introduction to Animal Behaviour (Cambridge University Press) is a classic now in its fifth edition. He has had a life-long concern for the natural world and how to re-establish a sustainable balance with its human population.

John Mead, 
environmentalist

A psychotherapist with a substantial knowledge environmental matters, in particular the extreme dangers arising out of climate change.  John Mead has been a Member of the Intermediate Technology Development Group (now Practical Action), and of UNED-UK’s Energy and Climate Change Panel.  His interest in this Network centres on the ‘consumption’ side of the ‘population coin’, with a particular focus on climate change.  

He has written a number of articles particularly with regard to the psychology of denial, and given talks to a diverse range of audiences, and has recently written a chapter for a book to be published through the Gaia Network.

Sara Parkin, OBE
Founder Director and Trustee of Forum for the Future works across a range of issues, with a main focus on integrating sustainability into post-school education, engineering and other professions

Sara designed the pioneering Forum Leadership for Sustainable Development Masters. Currently she sits on the Natural Environment Research Council and the board of Leadership Foundation for Higher Education. Sara is a Companion of the Institution of Civil Engineering and the Institute of Energy, and received an OBE for services to education and sustainable development in 2001.

In the past, Sara has contributed to the development of Green Parties world wide, as well as playing leading roles in the UK, and has served on the boards of the Environment Agency for England and Wales, Friends of the Earth (UK), New Economics Foundation (a member of PSN) and Groundwork.

Ndola Prata
Public Health Physician and Medical Demographer, University of California 

Ndola Prata, MD, MSc, is Assistant Adjunct Professor of Maternal and Child Health and International Health at the School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley. She is also the scientific director for the Bixby Program in Population, Family Planning and Maternal Health at UC Berkeley School of Public Health. 

Dr Prata is from Angola. Before coming to Berkeley she was head of the social statistics department at the National Institute of Statistics in Luanda, and is a practicing physician. She has also lived in Britain, France and the US, and worked in Mozambique, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Paraguay, Mexico, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Afghanistan.

Dr Nafis Sadik,
Special Adviser to the UN Secretary-General

Dr. Sadik, from Pakistan, is the UN Secretary-General’s Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Asia and the Pacific, with the rank of Under-Secretary-General.  

In 1971, she joined the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) serving in various capacities until her appointment as its Executive Director in 1987.   

In 2003, Dr. Sadik was designated as UNFPA’s Goodwill Ambassador for Obstetric Fistula and served as a member of the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change, and the Secretary-General’s High-Level Group on “Alliance of Civilizations”.

Professor Jay Satia,
Executive Director of the International Council on Management of Population Programmes (ICOMP) 

Jay Satia has been the Executive Director of ICOMP since 1993. Established in 1973 and based in Malaysia, ICOMP is an international NGO dedicated to seeking excellence in management of population programmes. ICOMP has about 50 members comprising heads of government population/ reproductive health/ HIV/AIDS programs, large NGOs and management-related institutions. 

Jay Satia was previously Professor at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, India for more than 20 years and served as its dean from 1987-89. 

He has published extensively and has been a consultant to many governments and international agencies including the World Bank and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). Professor Satia obtained his Ph.D. and masters in Industrial Engineering from Stanford University, USA.

Sir Crispin Tickell

Tony Worthington, 
former Member of Parliament, 1987-2005

Tony Worthington was Chair of the All-Party group on Overseas Development and a member of the International Development Select Committee of the House of Commons.  

His particular interest is in Reproductive Health and Development, and he was largely responsible for the influential report "The Missing Link" on the failure to link properly reproductive health services with HIV/Aids services, produced by the All-Party Group on Population and Development and Reproductive Health.

He is also concerned about the impact of population growth on the environment.