Beth Lavender Beth Lavender is the Senior Policy Manager in the Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Division at Natural Resources Canada (NRCan), and has worked on climate change adaptation issues domestically and internationally since 1994. She is responsible for developing strategic directions for NRCan’s adaptation program, which includes aspects related to national assessments, stakeholder engagement, and capacity building in Canada. She has authored chapters on impacts and adaptation in the Province of Ontario in two national-scale assessments (Canada Country Study, and From Impacts to Adaptation: Canada in a Changing Climate 2007), and led development of the Vulnerability, Impacts and Adaptation chapters in Canada’s second, third and fourth National Communications.
From 2007 to 2013, Beth worked for Global Affairs Canada, and was the lead neogiator for Canada on adaptation issues under the UNFCCC from 2010 – 2012. While there, she also worked on adaptation and broader environmental issues under the Arctic Council. During this time, she co-lead the development of the Arctic Adaptation Exchange, an international knowledge portal developed to facilitate knowledge exchange between communities, researchers and decision-makers across the Arctic region.
Beth is a member of the Canadian delegation to the UNFCCC, and over the last several years has co-facilitated adaptation negotiations, including the Nairobi Work Programmme, the Warsaw International Mechanism on Loss and Damage, National Adaptation Plans, and Adaptation Communications. Beth is a current member of the UNFCCC Least Developed Countries Expert Group (LEG).