Thursday, August 10, 2006

New Director for Regional Science Bureau for Asia


Professor Hubert Gijzen assumed the directorship of the UNESCO Jakarta office on 1 August 2006. The Jakarta office functions as UNESCO's Regional Science Bureau for Asia and Pacific covering more than 50 countries in the region. Prof. Gijzen will also be the UNESCO Representative to Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Timor Leste.

The press release announcing Prof. Gijzen's appointment states:
Hubert Gijzen is of Dutch nationality. Prior to joining UNESCO Jakarta, he was a Professor of Environmental Biotechnology and Head of Core in the UNESCO-IHE Institute of Water Education in Delft, The Netherlands. He also worked for the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs and for a number of universities, both in The Netherlands, as well as abroad. He has a broad science base and interest. Although he has a training background in Biology (MSc) and Biotechnology (PhD), he had the opportunity to work in a range of different disciplines during his career of 24 years, including microbiology, biotechnology, sanitary engineering, and environmental sciences. He has been involved in a number of international education, research and capacity building programmes and projects in various fields of natural sciences and engineering. He and his wife have lived and worked in different countries and regions, including Tanzania (5 years), Colombia (4 years) and Bangladesh (1.5 years).

Check out the websites:
* The UNESCO Jakarta Office
* The Regional Science Bureau for Asia and the Pacific

No comments: