Ajit Kumar Pattnaik
India
Vice President, Wetlands International, South Asia
Brief Resume of Dr. A.K.Pattnaik, IFS, Rtd.
Former Principal Chief Conservator of Forest
Dr Ajit Kumar Pattnaik joined Indian Forest Service in 1982, served for 35 years and superannuated in 2017 as Principal Chief Conservator of Forest. He has 38 years of varied professional experience managing forest, wetlands, coastal zone, wildlife, natural resources and biodiversity. He headed the most successful restoration project of Chilika Lake, a Ramsar site located in India, and was severely degraded by adopting the ILBM framework. Chilika Lake was removed from Montreux record (threatened list of Ramsar site) in 2002 due to successful ecological restoration and emerged as a global example. CDA was conferred with the prestigious “Ramsar Wetland Conservation Award 2002” by Ramsar Convention, Switzerland and Indira Gandhi Parayavaran Purashkar by MoEF&CC, GoI. He took the lead in the formulation & implementation of the World Bank aided Integrated Coastal Zone Management Project for Odisha Coast as Project Director from 2010-2017. He formulated and implemented the first 3rd generation 135 million US$, JICA assisted Odisha Forestry Sector Development Project as Project Director. Acted as sectoral head of coastal & disaster; in formulating “Climate change action plan of Odisha”. He has over 100 scientific publications, including eight books as primary and co-author and oral communication, workshop facilitation in more than 30 countries. He is a member of several international and national Committees and Panels.
He is a Member of the Scientific Committee of International Lake Environment Committee Foundation (ILEC) Japan. Vice President, Wetlands International South Asia (WISA). Member of the International Steering Committee, Ramsar Center, Japan, Member Technical Advisory Group, Ministry of Water Resources, GoI, Senior Scientific Advisor NCSCM, Chennai, Government of India, Member Odisha Pollution Control Board & Short Consultant at World Bank.