Loading...
Hacking Conservation
HBH 1206
5000 Forbes Avenue, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, United States
View Map
42
Registered
Registration
Registration is now closed (this event already took place).
Details
By 2050, the global population will reach 9.6 billion people. To feed an increasingly affluent global population, we will need 70% more food production and doubling of inputs, available water, and arable land, which will increasingly come at the expense of natural systems. Climate change and environmental degradation have profound consequences for food security, water availability, and global health, as well as the extinction of much of the planet’s biodiversity. We need to transform our approach to conservation and development, and need a new community of solvers and solutions.
So what do next generation approaches for conservation and development look like? What is the role of exponential technology, entrepreneurship, and open innovation in solving these wicked problems? What role does rapid iteration, adaptive conservation & development efforts, value proposition formulation and testing, frugal design, principals of digital development, open innovation, and mass collaboration play in solving wicked problems. This talk goes through some of the most promising examples of solutions that address the drivers, not just the symptoms of these challenges, and proposes a new opportunity.
Where
HBH 1206
5000 Forbes Avenue, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, United States
Speakers
Alex Dehgan
Founder and CEO
Conservation X Labs
Alex Dehgan is the CEO and co-founder of Conservation X Labs, a startup for tech innovation for conservation and development. Conservation X Labs seeks to harness exponential technologies, open innovation, and a for-profit entrepreneurship to dramatically improve the speed, sustainability, and scale of conservation efforts. Prior to founding Conservation X Labs, Dr. Alex Dehgan served as the Chief Scientist at USAID, with rank of Assistant Administrator, and founded the Global Development Lab. Prior to USAID, Alex worked in multiple positions within the Office of the Secretary, and the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, at the Dept. of State. At State, Alex developed political and science diplomacy strategies towards addressing our most challenging foreign policy issues in Iraq, Egypt, and the greater Islamic world, including engagement with Iran under the Obama Administration with Amb. Dennis Ross. As head of the Wildlife Conservation Society Afghanistan Program, Alex helped create Afghanistan├óÔé¼Ôäós first national park. Dr. Dehgan holds a Ph.D and M.Sc. from The University of Chicago├óÔé¼Ôäós Committee on Evolutionary Biology, where he focused on extinction and adaptation of 12 lemur species during environmental change in tropical forests in Madagascar. He also holds a J.D. from the University of California, Hastings, and a B.S. from Duke University. In addition to serving as an adjunct faculty with Heinz College Washington DC, Alex serves as the Chanler Innovator in Residence at Duke University.