About

Dr Ritesh Kumar is the principal institutional representative of Wetlands International South Asia. Wetlands International South Asia is a part of the Wetlands International network, a global organisation dedicated to the conservation and wise use of wetlands.

Dr Kumar advises the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and several state governments on policy and management aspects of wetlands. In his over 25 years of work, he has helped draft the national regulatory framework of wetlands, technical guidelines on wetlands wise use, management planning, management effectiveness evaluation, climate risk assessment and others.  He has also led integrated management planning for several South Asian wetlands and coordinated multidisciplinary projects on wetlands assessment, ecosystem services evaluation, water management, sustainable livelihoods, disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation.

Dr Kumar is also a nominated member of the Scientific and Technical Review Panel of the Ramsar Convention and a coordinating lead author at the UNEP – Global Peatlands Initiate, Inter-governmental Science Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) for values assessment, nexus assessment and Asia Pacific Regional Assessment. To bring to the fore research South Asian wetlands, he has authored several peer-reviewed articles on wetlands conservation and management topics. He also serves on the Editorial Board of international journals Marine and Freshwater Research, Wetland Ecology and Management, and PLoS Water.