Remembering our friend Professor Saleemul Huq OBE
We are deeply saddened by the news of Professor Saleemul Huq’s passing on Saturday 28th October in Dhaka. Saleem was a highly respected member of our Living Deltas Hub External Advisory Board, and his contributions since the commencement of the Hub in 2019 have been invaluable. Throughout our collaborations with Saleem and the International Centre of Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) in Dhaka, we have not only built strong working relationships but also formed close friendships.
Professor Saleemul Huq on reciept of his honorary degree from Newcastle University
His loss is a significant one for the world, as he was one of the foremost climate change experts and was named as one of the top 20 climate change influencers in the world in 2020. In late 2021 Saleem visited the School of Geography, Politics and Sociology at Newcastle University and delivered an inspirational seminar on the role of Locally Led Adaptation in climate change adaptation efforts in Bangladesh and globally. Many colleagues in the School still talk of how that seminar made a deep and lasting impression on them.
Just a few months ago, in late July, we had the privilege of welcoming Saleem and his family to Newcastle-upon-Tyne as he received his honorary degree for outstanding services to climate change science from the School of Geography, Politics, and Sociology at Newcastle University. It seems fitting to share an adapted version of Saleem’s introduction on receiving his honorary degree from Newcastle University’s public orator Prof. J S Fitzgerald:
“Professor Saleemul Huq – Saleem to his friends – was one of the world’s most influential climate scientists. He was an academic, researcher and teacher, who bridged science and policy brilliantly. Named by the journal Nature as a ‘climate revolutionary’, and ranked among the top 20 climate change influencers, his work was nevertheless rooted in the daily experience of his home country. The results can be seen on and in the ground of Bangladesh.
Saleem was born in 1952 in Karachi to parents who worked in Pakistan’s diplomatic service before they opted for Bangladesh when it was established following the 1971 Liberation War. Their overseas postings meant he had an international childhood, growing up in Germany, Indonesia, and Kenya. Following a passion and talent for science, he studied Botany at Imperial College London, completing his PhD in 1979.
He worked in Bangladesh as an academic biologist, in 1984 co-founding a Think Tank, the Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies, focussing on environmental issues at a time when they were hardly a priority in public discourse. The Centre proved profoundly influential, however, helping the government of Bangladesh to establish an environment department and create its first environmental action plan.
Saleem was also Director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development and Professor at the Independent University of Bangladesh, a Senior Associate at the International Institute on Environment and Development in the UK, and Senior Adviser on Locally Led Adaptation with the Global Centre on Adaptation based in the Netherlands. He used these platforms to make major contributions in adaptation, in funding for Loss and Damage, and in growing capacity to address climate challenges.
By 2001 when Saleem came to be a lead author of reports produced by the International Panel on Climate Change (the IPCC), scientists were telling policymakers that warming will happen and that we will have to adapt. However, only a small proportion of adaptation aid seems to be reaching communities that have local knowledge and face the full force of climate events. Saleem and his colleagues have fostered locally-led adaptation in areas like living conditions, water supplies, resilient crops, shelter for displaced people, migrant-friendly towns, and platforms for sharing experience. He said that technology has an important place, but – fundamentally – transformation is brought about by people.
Now, Saleem argued, we are entering an era when loss and damage are inevitable. His work on Loss and Damage funding required persistence over a decade up to Glasgow COP26, and patience. Saleem’s colleague Dr Feisal Rahman said “I remember back in 2015 everyone including myself thought that this loss and damage agenda will never materialize! But Saleem had his eyes on this and now at least part of the job is done!”
He had many international distinctions: the McNamara Fellowship from World Bank, the Duggan Fellowship from the US National Resources Defence Council, the 2006 Burtoni Award, and a National Environment Award from the Government of Bangladesh. He was created OBE in the 2022 New Year Honours for services to combating climate change and was a leading contributor to the reports of the IPCC which won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.
Education and networks will be the foundations for a generation better equipped than ours to face the future in a changed climate. Saleem has been instrumental in establishing the Least Developed Countries Universities Consortium on Climate Change (LUCCC) and the Gobeshona Global 24/7 conferences that aim to turn research into action. He has been a much-valued friend of our University, serving as an external advisor to the Living Deltas Research Hub led by Professor Andy Large.
In recognition of his contributions to climate science and locally led adaptation, his international leadership on Loss and Damage, and his inspirational approach to the future not dominated by national rivalry but by solidarity, Professor Saleemul Huq OBE received an honorary degree from Newcastle University in July 2023.”
Most recently, in mid-September, Saleem graciously supported our Hub once again as a panellist in our National Ganges Brahmaputra Meghna (GBM) Delta Dialogue in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Elsewhere, in 2021 the Hub collaborated with Saleem and ICCCAD in events at the Resilience Hub at COP26 (Saleem attended every single Conference of the Parties from the inaugural COP at Copenhagen in 1992 to COP27 in Sharm El Sheik in 2022). The Hub contributed delta sessions to the last two Gobeshona Global conferences with more collaboration planned for Gobeshona Global 3 in spring 2024. Saleem was prominent in all these collaborations.
The news of Saleem's passing has deeply shaken our Hub community. We send our collective prayers, love, and sympathies to Saleem's family, as well as to his friends and colleagues in ICCCAD and in IIED. We know that his remarkable legacy will continue to inspire and guide us in our ongoing work.
IIED has opened this page of remembrance so that colleagues and friends can share their memories of their time with Saleem. More details here.