Luc Gnacadja

Luc Gnacadja, an architect from Benin, is the founder and president of GPS-Dev (Governance & Policies for Sustainable Development), a think tank whose mission is to make governance systems more conducive to sustainable development. He has a long and high-level expertise and credentials in reflecting, advocating and mainstreaming environmental matters in public policies for the advancement of sustainable development, as well as a proven leadership ability to facilitate change and transformation in national regional and multilateral contexts.
He is a past Minister of Environment and Urban Development of Benin (1999-2005) and a former Executive Secretary of the UNCCD (2007-2013). In this latter capacity, he has been a guiding voice for sustainable land development in the negotiations leading up to the Rio+20 Summit in 2012 and is the architect of the concept of “Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN)” of “The Future We Want” now imbedded in the 2030 development agenda as SDG target 15.03.

He owns with his son an urban farm in the suburbs of Cotonou dedicated to organic agriculture

Luc Gnacadja is currently the Chair of the Science Task Force of and member of the Advisory Board for the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration 2021-2030 and the Chairperson of the Strategic Council of the Sahara and Sahel Observatory (OSS). He is the Co-Chair of the Executive Committee of the Adaptation Benefits Mechanism championed par the African Development Bank.

He is a Councillor of the World Future Council.