This session details the UN Taskforce on Seaweed - an initiative bringing together partners to unlock the potential of seaweed for sustainable food systems, climate resilience, and coastal livelihoods.
Seaweed stands at the intersection of nutrition, environmental sustainability, and economic opportunity, especially for developing coastal nations.
The Taskforce aims to foster coordinated action across trade, investment, science, and policy to scale up sustainable seaweed value chains.
Speakers:
Moderator:
- David Vivas Eugui, Chief of Ocean and Circular Economy Unit, a.i., Trade, Environment, Climate Change and Sustainable Development Branch, UNCTAD
Panelists:
- Mr. Mochammad Firman Hidayat, Council Member/Executive Director, Priority Economic Program Acceleration, National Economic Council, Republic of Indonesia
- Ms. Felaniaina Marie Stéphanie, Directrice, Développement de l’Aquaculture, Madagascar
- Mr. Mohamed Sheikh, Deputy Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Livestock and Fisheries, United Republic of Tanzania
- Ms. Yas Farjad, Chargée des affaires européennes, internationales et du développement économique des filières aquacoles, Bureau de l’aquaculture
- Ms. Chantal Line Carpentier, Head, Trade, Environment, Climate Change and Sustainable Development Branch Division on International Trade and Commodities, UNCTAD
- Mr. Alejandro Rivera Rojas, Chief, MSME Development and Job Creation Unit, UNIDO
- Ms. Melanie Cueff, Scientific Officer, Global Seaweed Coalition
- Mr. Damian Prescod, Project Coordinator, Oceans Economy Unit, Export Barbados, BIDC
David Vivas Eugui is Chief of Ocean and Circular Economy Unit, a.i., Trade, Environment, Climate Change and Sustainable Development Branch, at UNCTAD.
Previously, he was a Senior Economic Affairs Officer in UNCTAD’s Trade Negotiations and Commercial Diplomacy Branch, Deputy Programmes Director at the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD), Senior Attorney at the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), Attaché for Legal Affairs at the Mission of Venezuela to the World Trade Organization (WTO) and Staff Attorney at the Venezuelan Institute of Foreign Trade. David is an international expert with more than 20 years of experience on legal and economic issues.
He has worked as an advisor and consultant for various institutions, international and national organizations and has lectured on intellectual property, trade, oceans economy and environmental law at the University of Strasbourg (CEIPI), Universidad de Buenos Aires (Argentina), Universidad Javeriana (Colombia), Maastricht University (the Netherlands), WIPO Distant Learning Academy, and University of Business and International Studies (Switzerland).
He holds a JD from the Universidad Catolica Andres Bello, an LLM from Georgetown University and a Master in Transnational Business from the Universidad Externado de Colombia.
Chantal Line Carpentier joined UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD)'s Division on International Trade and Commodities (DITC) in 2014, after serving as Chief, UNCTAD New York Office of the Secretary-General. She brings to the Branch over 25 years of work experience in international trade, and environmental and agro-economics.
Prior to working with UNCTAD, she supported the Commission on Sustainable Development and served as Major Groups (of non-State actors) coordinator for the UN Rio+20 Conference and the SDGs negotiations at the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA). She also supported the sustainable consumption and production and sustainable agriculture negotiations.
As Head of the North American Free Trade Agreement Commission for Environmental Cooperations, she lead work on the nexus of environment, economy, and trade. She also served as Agro-environmental Policy Analyst for Winrock International, and post-Doctoral fellow/Brazil office manager for the International Food Policy Research Institute.
She has an extensive list of publications on sustainable agriculture, trade and environment, sustainable consumption and production, financing for sustainable development, stakeholder engagement, global value chains, micro, small and medium enterprises, and economic empowerment of women.
She obtained a PhD. in Agro-Environmental Economics from Virginia Technology and MSc. and BSc. from McGill University.
30 years of professional experience in the development of innovation, science, and technology policies and ecosystems; industrial resources efficiency use and circular economy, innovation management standards; quality infrastructure for market access of fisheries and aquaculture, SMEs upgrading and digital transformation.
Currently coordinating UNIDO Task Force efforts related to the Blue Industry Programmatic Framework development and its contribution to the Blue Economy.
Melanie Cueff is a Research Engineer at the French National Research Center (CNRS) and serves as the Scientific Officer of the Global Seaweed Coalition, hosted by the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC). The Coalition is a global partnership established to support the safe and sustainable scale-up of the seaweed sector.
Melanie has recently focused on topics related to seaweed and genebanks, as well as ecosystem services provided by seaweed farming. Previously, she worked on addressing the challenge of invasive sargassum in the Caribbean, focusing on valorization projects.
Her experience spans across multinational businesses, governmental institutions, and startups, bringing a diverse background to her current work in research and sustainability.
