Shefali Juneja Lakhina, Phd Email & Phone Number

Shefali has over 20 years of international experience and thought leadership on disasterpolicy, practice, and research. Since 2004, she has contributed to conceptualizing,implementing, facilitating, and monitoring a range of policies, programs, and initiatives forstrengthening disaster resilience across South Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, South-EastEurope, Australia, and the United States. Over the years, she has led innovations in disasterresilience policy and programs for international humanitarian and development agencies,regional intergovernmental organizations, national authorities, local councils, and civil societyorganizations. In 2020, she cofounder Wonder Labs to address the wildfire crisis through convergence research, policy advocacy, and technology investments.Key highlights include:2007: leading development of the United Nations’ HFA Monitor, a national reporting tool, 2009: leading production, design, and co-authoring the United Nations’ first Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction, 2012: leading design and delivery of the World Bank’s award-winning City-to-City Sharing Initiative. 2018: doctoral research received a high commendation from the New South Wales Office of Emergency Services for contributions to understanding how people from diverse refugee and migrant backgrounds practice safety from natural hazards in the Illawarra region of New South Wales, Australia. As Co-Founder of Wonder Labs (founded in April 2020), Dr. Lakhina is currently engaged in co-developing social, ecological, and technological innovations with communities on the frontlines of extreme climate impacts, including wildfires. Key highlights include:2020: led an NSF-supported CONVERGE Working Group on 'Wildfire Preparedness and Evacuation Planning in a Pandemic' (2020-21). 2021: launched the Reimagining 2025: Living with Fire Design Challenge to center the voices of students and early career researchers in community wildfire risk reduction efforts. 2022: led development of The State of FireTech 2022 Report for the Wildfire Technology Funders Group. Specialties: Program development for disaster risk reduction and recovery initiatives, conceptualizing monitoring and reporting frameworks, policy and strategy development for reducing disaster risks, resource mobilization for national authorities/ international development partners, developing information and communication materials and training modules/ materials, qualitative and narrative social science research, science, data, and technology for disaster risk reduction.

Listed skills include International Development, Policy, Program Development, Training, and 23 others.