Lea Kai

Head - Climate Change Unit Ministry of the Environment Beirut, Lebanon

Biography

Ms. Kai is the head of the Climate Change Unit at the Ministry of Environment, which is mandated to design and implement national climate change policies in Lebanon. The Unit also leads the national work on devising sectoral mitigation targets (e.g., INDC or national commitments under the Paris Agreement) and adaptation plans and implement obligations under the international climate treaties. Ms. Kai is in charge of developing and reporting Lebanon’s greenhouse gas emissions in addition to producing technical studies such as climate change impacts and their economic cost on Lebanon, technology pathways assessment, emission reduction potential of sectoral strategies and increasing resilience and adaptation to most vulnerable sectors. She is also a member of the Lebanese delegation to the UNFCCC and has been negotiating the climate change agreement for 10 years. In2016, she has established the ‘Lebanon Climate Act’ initiative, which is the first platform in the region aiming at involving the private sector in supporting the government’s efforts in combatting climate change.

Ms. Kai holds a BSc in environmental health and an MSc in environmental technology from the American University of Beirut. She is also a UNFCCC lead reviewer of national inventories of developed countries. She is currently pursuing public policy studies at the Harvard Kennedy School for Government.