Matti Siemiatycki
Associate Professor of Geography and Planning & Interim Director of School of Cities, University of Toronto

Professor Matti Siemiatycki is Associate Professor in the Department of Geography & Planning, and Canada Research Chair in Infrastructure Planning and Finance. His research focuses on delivering large-scale infrastructure projects, public-private partnerships, and the effective integration of infrastructure into the fabric of cities. Professor Siemiatycki was a faculty leader of StudentMoveTO, a joint initiative between the University of Toronto, York, Ryerson and OCADU that successfully developed a model for inter-university research collaboration and mobilization on city-building issues. Professor Siemiatycki is a highly engaged public scholar with a deep commitment to informing public discourse about city building. He regularly provides advice to governments, civic institutions and industry, and is a frequent commentator in the media and public realm on urban issues, with a honed ability to communicate with various audiences.

Reid McAlpine
Councillor of City of Markham & Member of UEF Steering Committee

Reid holds an MBA from London Business School at the University of London in England. While in the program he spent an exchange semester at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He also conducted hands-on business consulting projects in Hong Kong, Britain, Poland and Russia. Reid also earned an honours BA in economics and political studies from Queen’s University. He holds French language diplomas from the Sorbonne and the Université Savoie Mont Blanc in France. Reid spent 25 years with Pearson, the world’s leading education company. He led large teams to develop resources for school students across Canada. He is particularly proud of the work he did to develop innovative world-class teaching tools to support struggling mathematics students.

António Guterres
Secretary General of United Nations 

António Guterres, the ninth Secretary-General of the United Nations, took office on 1st January 2017.

Having witnessed the suffering of the most vulnerable people on earth, in refugee camps and in war zones, the Secretary-General is determined to make human dignity the core of his work, and to serve as a peace broker, a bridge-builder and a promoter of reform and innovation.
Prior to his appointment as Secretary-General, Mr. Guterres served as United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees from June 2005 to December 2015, heading one of the world’s foremost humanitarian organizations during some of the most serious displacement crises in decades. The conflicts in Syria and Iraq, and the crises in South Sudan, the Central African Republic and Yemen, led to a huge rise in UNHCR’s activities as the number of people displaced by conflict and persecution rose from 38 million in 2005 to over 60 million in 2015.

Chris Williams
Head of New York Office and North America, UN-Habitat

Chris Williams serves as Director of the New York Office of UN-Habitat, the organization of the United Nations responsible for housing and urban development based in Nairobi, Kenya. He represents UN-Habitat in inter-governmental and inter-agency processes, and facilitate cooperation with partners based in North America.

Atsushi Koresawa,
Director of Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific of UN-Habitat

Atsushi Koresawa is the Director for UN-Habitat Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, Fukuoka, Japan since June 2017. Before joining UN-Habitat, Mr. Koresawa served at various ministries and agencies of the Japanese government since 1988, his recent responsibilities including the Director for Management and Coordination at the Chubu Regional Development Bureau of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, the Director for Search and Rescue Operations and International Cooperation at the Fire and Disaster Management Agency of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications and Director for Research at the Real Estate Transaction Improvement Organization. He also has served at several international organization including UN-Habitat (Nairobi) (1991-1994), the OECD (Paris) (1997-2000) and the Asian Disaster Reduction Center (Kobe) (2009-2012).

Narayanan Edadan
Housing and Disaster Risk Reduction Consultant of World Bank

He has worked extensively in the areas of Urban Development Planning, Low Income Housing Financing and Affordable Housing Strategies, Disaster Risk Management/ Post Disaster Housing Reconstruction and DRM

David Agnew
President of Seneca College

With extensive experience in the public, private and non-profit sectors, David Agnew became the fifth president of Seneca in July 2009. Under his leadership, Seneca has experienced record growth in enrolment and expanded its offerings in both undergraduate and graduate programs. One of the largest colleges in Canada, Seneca is growing its applied research, broadening international and corporate partnerships, investing in capital expansion and adopting an innovative academic direction to increase experiential, cross-disciplinary and flexible learning opportunities. He was the President and CEO of UNICEF Canada, the first head of the organization recruited from outside the international development sector. As Principal for the consulting firm Digital 4Sight, he led the firm’s global research initiative on the impact of technology on government and democracy. In the co-operative sector, he was the Executive Vice-President and Corporate Secretary for the Credit Union Central of Ontario. Mr. Agnew was the Ombudsman for Banking Services and Investments, the national dispute resolution service for consumers and small businesses.

Nicholas You
Executive Director at Guangzhou Institute for Urban Innovation

Nicholas You is a veteran urban specialist and thought leader. He served as the senior policy and planning advisor to UN-Habitat and the manager of the Habitat II Conference held in Istanbul in 1996. He is the founder and honorary chairman of the UN-Habitat World Urban Campaign Steering Committee, Chair of the Urban Strategy and Innovation Council for ENGIE, the co-Chair of the Global Cities Business Alliance, former chairman of the Assurance Group for Urban Infrastructure of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development. He is a member of the board of Citiscope, the Huairou Commission and the Joslyn Institute for Sustainable Communities and serves as a director of the Guangzhou Institute for Urban Innovation and as an adjunct to the Centre for Liveable Cities, Singapore. He regularly advises central and local governments, industry and civil society organisations on strategic planning and governance.   

Ali Alraouf
Professor of Architecture, Urbanism & Planning Theories & ISOCARP Board Member & Congress 2020 Special Coordinator

Ali A. Alraouf is an architect, urban designer and planner interested in research and practice related to comprehensive sustainable design and urban planning. He was a Visiting Scholar at the University of California at Berkeley-USA. Alraouf has held permanent and visiting teaching and research positions at regional and international universities. Alraouf is a registered architect and urban planner in Egypt, Bahrain and Qatar. He is an associate member of the American Institute of Architects, Middle East and Gulf Chapter. Alraouf published more than 105 journal refereed papers, critical reviews, essays, in addition to books and book chapters. Alraouf’s current research interests are: Knowledge-based Urban Development, Post-Carbon Contemporary Gulf Cities, Museums in the Gulf, Urban vitalisation of historical districts, Knowledge and Creative cities. He serves on editorial boards and acts as a reviewer for international journals and conferences. He provides consultancy in numerous projects regionally and internationally and acts as a consultant for international organisations including UN-Habitat, UNESCO, ESCOWA, ICOMOS among others.

Ted Howard
President & Co-Founder of The Democracy Collaborative

Ted Howard is the Co-founder and President of The Democracy Collaborative. Previously, he served as the Executive Director of the National Center for Economic Alternatives. In July 2010, Ted was appointed the Steven Minter Senior Fellow for Social Justice at The Cleveland Foundation, a position he held for four years. Working with the Foundation, he was a member of a team that developed the comprehensive job creation and wealth building strategy which resulted in the Evergreen Cooperative Initiative. Ted serves on the board of directors of LIFT, a national organization dedicated to engaging young Americans in combating poverty in our nation’s core urban areas; its chapters are based in Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago, New York City, Los Angeles and Washington, DC. He is also a member of the board of directors for BALLE, a national alliance championing sustainability, social finance and community-based economic development, and is also a founding member of the board of the Evergreen Cooperative Corporation.

Layne Robinson
Head of Social Policy Department of Commonwealth Secretariat

Layne Robinson is an experienced Policy Head with a demonstrated history of working in the public policy industry. He is skilled in Youth Development, Government, Research, Programme design and implementation, Public Speaking, Facilitation, and International Relations. He is a consulting professional with a graduate degree focused on Development Economics and Political Science from the University of the West Indies, Mona. 

Guillermo (Gill) Penalosa
Founder & Chair of 8 80 Cities

Guillermo (Gil) Penalosa is passionate about creating cities for all people. He has inspired and advised decision makers in more than 350 different cities around the world on how to create vibrant cities with healthy communities where all people can live happier, regardless of age, gender, ability, or socio-economic or ethnic status.
His focus is on the design and use of parks, streets, sidewalks as great public places, as well as sustainable mobility: walking, riding bicycles, taking public transit, and new uses of cars. Guillermo highlights the benefits to public health, environment, mobility, economic development. Guillermo is Founder and Chair of 8 80 Cities, a successful Canadian based international non-profit organization, grounded on a simple but powerful concept which still guides much of his work: What if everything we did in our cities had to be great for an 8-year-old and an 80-year-old? Surely, we would end up with fantastic cities for all!

Mosleh Duhoky
President of Duhok University

Dr. Mosleh Duhoky has been the President of the University of Duhok since 2012. Prior to this, he served as the Dean of the College of Agriculture at the University of Duhok in 2001-2010. During his entire career in Academia, Dr. Duhoky served at different universities in Kurdistan Region under different academic titles. Dr. Duhoky has been elected a member of the Board of Directors at the International Association of Universities (IAU) in 2016. He also served as a consultant and a team leader at FAO representation in Iraq.

Martina Otto
Head of Cities of United Nations Environmental Programme

Martina leads UN Environment's work on cities, coordinating the UN Environment wide offer to support cities and promote multi-level policy integration, and is in charge of the cooperation with other UN agencies and partners in the sustainable urban development space. Under her responsibility is also the work on buildings, with the Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction, food systems, and the contributions to the respective programmes under the 10 Year Framework of Programmes. Martina has worked for UN Environment since 1999 in different substantive and management functions. Her areas of expertise include sustainable energy, transport, buildings, climate change, air quality and sustainable consumption and production.

Michael Brooks
CEO of REALPAC

Michael Brooks is the CEO of REALPAC and is responsible for the Associations’ strategic planning, policy formulation, government relations, national and international liaison with associations in the USA, UK, Asia and Australia via membership in the Real Estate Equity Securitization Alliance and has been the catalyst to REALPAC’s growth over the past 15 years. Michael is a former Associate Professor at Ryerson University.

Michael has led the market and regulatory transformation in Canada, with effective representation for the REIT vehicle on cross-border and domestic tax issues and capital market and regulatory issues nationally and internationally. He has been the driving force behind the development of the REALPAC sustainability platform, including its Green Lease, Green Lease Tenant Guide, Corporate Social Responsibility guidelines and industry outreach with various national and international organizations. Michael is the former Treasurer, Executive Committee and Board member of the Canada Green Building Council.