Prof Saleemul Huq, Head of the ecbi Training and Support Programme, has been awarded an OBE in the UK New Year's Honours List for services to combatting International Climate Change. The honour was awarded in recognition of his work to build climate expertise in Bangladesh, the UK and around the globe. Dr Huq is director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD). He is an expert on the links between climate change and sustainable development, particularly from the perspective of vulnerable developing countries, as well as the lead author of chapters in the third, fourth and fifth assessment reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Prof Huq heads up the ecbi Training and Support Programme, led by ICCCAD, which has three main elements: capacity building of junior negotiators to the UNFCCC through regional and pre-COP training workshops; capacity provision to the Group of Least Developed Countries (LDC Group); and bursaries for negotiators from LDCs, to ensure their continued participation and capacity development in UNFCCC processes.

Prof Huq said: "It has been a pleasure for me to have been associated over more than two decades with capacity building programme of ecbi through which we have been able to capacitate more than one generation of climate change Negotiators from the Least Developed Countries. This honour is further recognition that the work still continues and remains as important as ever."