The United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) set up by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in 2012, promotes practical problem solving for sustainable development, including the design and implementation of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), adopted in 2015 by the United Nations.
Through a growing number of National and Regional Networks, SDSN supports the localization and implementation of SDGs, develops long-term transformative pathways for sustainable development, promotes education around Agenda 2030, and launches solution initiatives.
The Greek SDSN has been included in the SDSN network and is co-hosted by ICRE8: International Center for Research on the Environment and the Economy and the Political Economy of Sustainable Development Lab. It is co-chaired by Prof. Phoebe Koundouri and Prof. Andreas Papandreou, aiming to contribute to achieving the goals of the SDSN network.
The EIT Regional Innovation Scheme accelerates climate innovation across Europe. EIT RIS facilitates connections into our established innovation hubs, now in 12 countries in the centre, east and south of Europe, securing EIT Climate-KIC’s pan-European reach, boosting climate innovation capacity across the continent.
The newly established EIT Climate KIC Greece Hub is composed by a consortium of various organisations across the knowledge triangle: the partners Athena Research and Innovation Center (ATHENA RC) Academy of Athens (AA) -Research Centre for Atmospheric Physics and Climatology, European Regional Framework for Co-operation (ERFC) Uni.Fund, supported by the associate Partners: United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network (UN SDSN-Greece, hosted by ICRE8: International Center for Research on the Economy and the Environment) Foundation for Economic and Industrial Research (IOBE) Eunice Energy Group.
Prof. Phoebe Koundouri founded the Research laboratory on Socio-Economic and Environmental Sustainability (ReSEES) in June 2016. The ReSEES laboratory is the outcome of the evolution of the Research Team on Socio-Economic and Environmental Sustainability.
ReSEES does policy relevant interdisciplinary research on environmental, natural resources and energy issues. The overarching goal of ReSEES theoretical and empirical research is to support the understanding and implementation of Sustainable Development.
Central to ReSEES laboratory mission is the pursuit of excellence in the conduct and presentation of research and a commitment to explore relevant environmental, natural resources and energy, issues for a variety of circumstances and stakeholders and across different temporal and spatial scales.
Research tools include financial analysis, socio-economic and econometric analysis, environmental valuation, political and institutional analysis, integrated environmental-economic modeling, life cycle analysis, risk analysis, geographical information systems, game theory, information technology decision making tool development.
Professor Dr. Phoebe Koundouri holds a PhD and MPhil in Economics and Econometrics from the University of Cambridge (UK). She is Professor (Chair) of Sustainable Development (Economics and Econometrics) at the School of Economics, Athens University of Economics and Business (Greece) and she is the elected President of the European Association of Environmental and Natural Resource Economists (EAERE) (with more than 1200 scientific member institutions, from more than 75 different countries). Prof. Koundouri is listed in the 1% of most-cited women economists in the world, with 15 published books and more than 250 published scientific papers.
Prof. Phoebe Koundouri is also the Founder and Scientific Director of the Research laboratory on Socio-Economic and Environmental Sustainability (ReSEES) at the Athens University of Economics and Business and an affiliated Professor at the ATHENA Research and Innovation Center (Greece) where she directs EIT Climate-KIC Hub Greece of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology. She is also the co-chair of the United Nations Sustainable Development Network Greece (UN SDSN Greece), chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of the International Centre for Research on the Environment and the Economy (ICRE8) and chair of the scientific advisory board of the European Forest Institute.
In the past, Professor Koundouri has held academic positions at the University of Cambridge, University College London, the University of Reading and the London School of Economics. She acts as an advisor to the European Commission, World Bank, EIB, EBRD, OECD, UN, NATO, WHO, numerous national and international foundations and organizations, as well as national governments in all five continents. Notably she is currently member of the drafting Priministerial Committee for 10-year development plan for Greece, as well as in the Climate Change Committee of the Greek Ministry of Environment and Energy. She holds a global leadership role in the UN SDSN for European Green Deal (EGD) implementation, Sustainable SHipping and Ports, 4-seas Blue Growth Initiative and is leader (together with Prof. Jeff Sachs) of the Senior Working Group on Transformation Pathways for the implementation of EGD. She is also a member of the CEPR (Center for European and Policy Research) Network (RPN) on Climate Change https://cepr.org/content/cepr-rpn-climate-change-researchers and a Commissioner of the New Lancet Commission on COVID-19 of the Lancet and the Sustainable Development Institute of the University of Columbia, US https://covid19commission.org/commissioners.
Since 1997, she has coordinated more than 77 interdisciplinary research projects and has attracted significant competitive research funding. Professor Koundouri and her large interdisciplinary team have produced research and policy results that have contributed to accelerating the research commercialization for the sustainability transition in Europe, as well as shaping European policies. Over the last two decades, Professor Koundouri has given keynote and public lecturers all over the world and received various prizes for academic excellence.
