Sustainability in Food and Water: An Asian Perspective

Author Biography

Prof. Akimasa Sumi Professor and Executive Director of the Transdisciplinary Initiative for Global Sustainability (TIGS) at the University of Tokyo (UT). He started his career serving for the Japan Meteorological Agency and later joined UT, as a professor. His research interest is focused on numerical modeling of weather and climate, especially in the context of global climate change. Recently he led a Japanese team to build the highest-resolution climate model for use with Japan’s Earth Simulator, one of the world’s best supercomputers. The successful outcome deepened the understanding of climate change, and significantly contributed to the most recent report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). He was also a Lead Author of chapter 8 of AR4, Working Group I of IPCC. From 1994-2004, he served as Director of the Center for Climate System Research at UT. As the research need on global warming has changed with the changing public awareness, he expanded his research to cover global sustainability, a key concept in addressing climate change. Since 2005, he has been working as the Executive Director in TIGS and promoted researches on various aspects of global sustainability. Currently he also serves as a Member of the Central Environment Council of the Japanese Government. Dr. Kensuke Fukushi Dr. Kensuke FUKUSHI is an associate professor at Transdisciplinary Initiative for Global Sustainability (TIGS), Integrated Research System for Sustainability Science (IR3S), University of Tokyo. After receiving his PhD from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Utah in 1996, he worked as an assistant professor at Department of Civil Engineering, Tohoku University from 1996 until 1999, as an assistant professor at School of Environment, Resources and Development, Asian Institute of Technology, Thailand from 1999 until 2001, and as an associate professor at the same school until 2001. Then he movedto an associate professor at Environmental Science Center, University of Tokyo in 2001, and arrived at the current position in 2006. He is an expert on environmental engineering, and especially familiar with pollution and remediation of heavy metals in water and soil, and risk assessment. He published his work in various international journals related to water research, environmental engineering, and microbiology. Dr. Ryo Honda Dr. Ryo HONDA is a project assistant professor at Transdisciplinary Initiative for Global Sustainability (TIGS), Integrated Research System for Sustainability Science (IR3S), University of Tokyo. He has got his PhD at Department of Urban Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, University of Tokyo in 2005. He is an expert in biological wastewater treatment and water resource management. He has good experiences in the field studies in developing world in Asia. He published his work in international journals on environmental engineering and applied microbiology. Dr. Khondoker Mahbub Hassan Dr. Khondoker Mahbub HASSAN is a project researcher at Transdisciplinary Initiative for Global Sustainability (TIGS), Integrated Research System for Sustainability Science (IR3S), University of Tokyo. He got his PhD from the Department of Urban Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, University of Tokyo in 2009. In his home country, he holds a position of Assistant Professor, Department of Civil Engineering, Khulna University of Engineering & Technology, Bangladesh. He is an expert in water treatment and water resource management. He was involved with many water related projects for field implementation in the developing countries in Asia. He published his work in various international journals related to water research, and environmental engineering.