Professor Debra Roberts: South Africa’s First Female African IPCC Co-Chair and Sustainable Cities Expert

Professor Debra Roberts is one of the most influential figures in South African climate change research. Professor Roberts is a Durban-based climate researcher who currently holds the Co-Chair position in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Working Group II. As IPCC Co-Chair, she plays a crucial role in the IPCC’s assessment of climate change, a position that marks a first for South Africa and the first time a woman from Africa has held such a role. She is also recognized as an expert in climate change adaptation and has been involved in both research and policy development. 

Professor Roberts has three decades of experience as an academic and senior municipal planning official. She was Durban’s first Chief Resilience Officer, responsible for overseeing the development of the city’s resilience strategy to climate change. She also served as a consultant to the Global Commission on Adaptation and the United Nations Secretary General’s 2019 Climate Summit.  Her work has a strong focus on urban climate change and sustainable city initiatives. She was a member of the South African United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) negotiating team until December 2015 and has sat on various international advisory bodies focused on climate change issues in cities, such as the Rockefeller Foundation’s Asian Cities Climate Change Resilience Network and UN-Habitat’s 2011 ‘Cities and Climate Change’ Global Report). In 2019, she was included in a list of the World’s 100 Most Influential People in Climate Policy.

This Post was submitted by Climate Scorecard South Africa Country Manager Rugare Zhou.