Soch 2024

PSA Invites You to Soch 2024! 

February 17th, 2024

10AM - 3:30 PM
Columbia University
New York, NY

2024 Theme - ایک پائیدار مستقبل (A Sustainable Future) - Pakistan and the Climate Crisis

Soch is our annual Academic Symposium. Every year, PSA invites academics, journalists, scientists, and politicians to discuss important South Asian issues. Previous themes include "Building Resilience Through Innovations" and "Naya Pakistan, Magar Kiska Pakistan?" In 2024, we are thrilled to bring Soch back to Columbia’s campus since the pandemic with delegations from all Ivies in attendance, as well as NYC Pakistani community members.

This year, Soch consists of an opening keynote, two panels, and a closing keynote, with panels moderated by Columbia affiliates in the climate space. With this conference, we place climate justice, climate mitigation and adaptation within Pakistan, the disproportionate vulnerability of certain populations (such as women and children), transnational politics (water governance and cooperation with neighboring countries such as China and India), and international climate conference discussion, at the forefront of the dialogue.

Keynote Speakers

  • Youth Climate Advisor to United Nations Secretary General

    Ayisha Siddiqa is a Pakistani human rights and land defender serving as a Youth Climate Advisor to the UN Secretary General. In 2020, she co-founded Polluters Out, a global youth activist coalition, and helped launch the Fossil Free University, an activism training course. As part of her activism, Ayisha has helped organize multiple school strikes for climate action that mobilized hundreds of thousands of young people. She has directed and led campaign efforts at the international level to help achieve victories such as the Loss and Damage Fund at COP28. Her expertise in lobbying around climate negotiations has earned her recognition as a strategist among national and youth delegations in the UNFCCC.

    As a research scholar at the New York University School of Law, Ayisha is studying cases at the intersection of human rights and environmental law. She sits on the board of the Home Planet Fund and is on the Steering Committee of the Youth Climate Justice Fund. Ayisha was recognized on the cover of TIME magazine, as one of the Women of the Year 2023.

  • Director, Intergovernmental Affairs UNEP New York

    Jamil Ahmad has been Director of the UN Environment Programme, New York Office since 2014. He joined the UN in 2008 in Nairobi as Head of the Secretariat of the UNEP Governing Council. A senior career diplomat of Pakistan, Jamil Ahmad has worked in duty stations across Africa, Asia, and Europe for more than 30 years and accumulated vast experience in environmental policy-making and multilateral negotiations. He was lead negotiator of the Group of 77 & China for Climate Change under Pakistan’s chairmanship in 2007 culminating at COP13 to UNFCCC in Bali in 2007. A passionate advocate of sustainability, he regularly engages with governments, academia, civil society, and others. He publishes regularly on current environmental issues. Jamil Ahmad holds a master’s degree in Political Science.

Panel 1 - Climate Justice in Pakistan: Amplifying Marginalized Voices

Against the backdrop of Pakistan's unique climate vulnerabilities, this panel gathers together voices of advocacy, education, and journalism to shed light on the critical issue of climate inequities. From women and children to religious minorities and climate migrants, these often marginalized populations face unique challenges in the context of climate change. This panel acknowledges the systems in place that promote these inequities and the intersectional work that is necessary to provide climate justice. Stay tuned for the release of our four panelists for this panel!

Panel 1 - Amplifying Marginalized Voices: Climate Justice in Pakistan

  • Nikhil Anand

    Nikhil Anand is an environmental anthropologist whose research focuses on cities, infrastructure, state power, and climate change. He addresses these questions by studying the political ecology of cities, read through the different lives of water. His award-winning first book, Hydraulic City: Water and the Infrastructures of Politics in Mumbai (Duke University Press 2017), examines the everyday ways in which cities and citizens are made through the everyday management of water infrastructure. His new book project, Urban Seas, decenters the grounds of urban planning by drawing attention to the ways in which climate-changed seas are remaking coastal cities today.

  • Farwa Aamer

    Farwa Aamer is the Director of South Asia Initiatives at the Asia Society Policy Institute (ASPI) in New York where she oversees the institute’s policy work and projects in South Asia. Over the past years, Farwa has spearheaded several high-level Track II dialogues and discussions designed to facilitate greater inter-and intra-regional cooperation on issues and opportunities concerning water, energy, climate change, and sustainable development in South Asia, MENA, and Central Asia. Farwa also worked on highlighting the disproportionate impacts of climate change and water insecurity on women.

  • Mishalle Kayani

    Mishalle Kayani has worked in Pakistan over the last 6 years. Her experience includes working as a consultant for the Healthcare Department in the province of Punjab on Nutrition Reforms, researching family planning trends during COVID-19, and most recently managing Gallup Pakistan’s Public Health program through a variety of initiatives. At present, Mishalle is an MPH candidate in Global Health Epidemiology at George Washington University and her interests include the nexus between climate and health and investigating the social, behavioral, and commercial determinants of noncommunicable/chronic diseases in LMICs. Her previous research, through a graduate program at Duke University, focused on the gender dimensions of climate change, specifically, in the context of the province of Sindh in Pakistan.

  • Erum Sattar

    Erum Sattar, Researcher - LLB, LLM, SJD, Lincoln’s Inn, has degrees from the University of London and Harvard Law School and is a Member of the Bar of England and Wales and The Honourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn. Her work is centered on studying water both as a physical as well as a historically constructed, shared, and governed resource (particularly in the Indus River Basin). She is the Former Program Director of the Sustainable Water Management Program at Tufts University and an Adjunct Professor at the Elizabeth Haub School of Law, Pace University. She has taught at Northeastern University School of Law and the National University of Singapore School of Law. Her scholarly articles and book chapters have appeared in leading academic publications, including works on water economy, farming governance, and commercialization of items in Pakistan.

Panel 2 - Balancing Acts: Climate Mitigation and Adaptation

When looking to the present and future of Pakistan, this panel analyzes the current and future policies regarding climate mitigation and adaptation as climate change progresses. It looks at specific climate policies in place and analyzes the changed role of Pakistan in terms of global climate conferences. It emphasizes a focus on transnational relations including China, India, and Bangladesh in order to create cohesive action and transitions to clean energy while discussing the role of international entities as well. Stay tuned for the release of our panelists for this panel!

Panel 2 - Balancing Acts: Climate Mitigation and Adaptation

  • Vijay Kumar

    Vijay Kumar is a Postdoctoral Research Scientist at Columbia University in New York City, NY, USA. He possesses expertise in various domains, including data science, statistics, air monitoring, machine learning, and epidemiology. He specializes in both modeling and exposure analysis of air pollution, leveraging high spatiotemporal data from low-cost sensors and satellite imagery through machine learning and causal inference.

    Currently, he is involved in projects that utilize low-cost sensors in developing countries like Pakistan to gather comprehensive data on air pollution. One of his primary interests is understanding the impact of air pollution on public health and climate change.

  • Noman Bashir

    Noman Bashir is the Computing & Climate Impact Fellow at MIT Climate & Sustainability Consortium (MCSC) and an affiliate with MIT CSAIL. Before this, he worked as a postdoctoral research fellow at UMass Amherst. He also earned his Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from UMass Amherst in 2022. Driven by a passion for decarbonizing societal infrastructure, Noman's research primarily revolves around optimizing large-scale data centers, distributed edge computing systems, and cyber-physical energy systems.

    Noman Bashir has consistently delivered impactful contributions to sustainable computing throughout his academic journey. His track record includes notable achievements such as enhancing the efficiency and performance of energy systems, developing equitable approaches to decarbonize various societal sectors, reducing the cost of cloud computing for end-users, and driving innovation in decarbonizing data centers while boosting their efficiency. Additionally, he has made notable strides in enhancing the performance of edge computing systems. He received an MS in Energy Systems Engineering from the National University of Science and Technology Pakistan, and a BS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Engineering and Technology Lahore, Pakistan.

  • Jumaina Siddiqui

    Jumaina Siddiqui is the Director for Global Security and International Affairs. She is an international development practitioner with over 15 years of experience working on programs focused on peace and conflict, democracy & governance, climate change & the environment, and the rule of law in Asia. Before joining the Academy, Jumaina was the Senior Program Officer for South Asia at the U.S. Institute of Peace where she provided technical guidance to USIP’s work in Pakistan and South Asia. At USIP she helped to design research studies, dialogues, and on-the-ground programming in South Asia. Before USIP, she was with the National Democratic Institute as the Program Manager for Pakistan with a portfolio of projects on political party development, elections, and political participation of women and youth. Jumaina has also held positions at Global Communities, the American Bar Association’s Rule of Law Initiative, and the Stimson Center. Jumaina received her MA from New York University and BA from American University.

MODERATORS

  • Hamna Tariq is a Research Associate at the Energy for Growth Hub, a global energy think tank advancing solutions to end energy poverty and build a high-energy climate-resilient future. Before joining the Hub, Hamna was in graduate school, where she completed a project on carbon markets with Accenture’s Trading, Investment, and Optimization Strategy practice (ATIOS) team and interned with the South Asia practice at McLarty Associates, a global consulting firm specializing in international business and government relations. Hamna also interned with the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council in the summer of 2022. Before graduate school, Hamna was a Research Junior Fellow of nuclear strategy in South Asia for the Stimson Center. Hamna holds a Masters in International Affairs from the School of Public and International Affairs (SIPA) at Columbia University and a BA in International Studies from Trinity College.

  • Hadia Sheerazi is a Manager in RMI’s Climate-Aligned Industries Program, co-leading community engagement and equity-centered work to accelerate the decarbonization of the highest emitting industrial sectors while remediating the impacts of historic underinvestment, environmental injustice, and decades of legacy pollution in low-income, minority and frontline communities in the U.S. and around the world. Hadia also researches inclusive climate adaptation and is a contributing author on the New York City Panel on Climate Change (NPCC), which helps inform the city’s multi-hazard adaptation and resilience strategies to protect vulnerable and low-income communities from the worst impacts of extreme weather events.