Ritu Bharadwaj

Senior researcher (climate governance and finance team), Climate Change

With more than 18 years of senior policy development, research and management experience in government, funding agencies and international NGOs, Ritu has worked extensively on social protection, climate resilience (policy, planning and finance), forest and watershed management, resource conservation (water and energy efficiency, renewables and circular economy), livelihood and gender issues.

Full biography

Expertise

Social protection, climate resilience, watershed and forest management, migration, gender and food security.

Before IIED

Worked with the government of India for eight years, where she was involved in policy development, implementation, and coordination of flagship government programmes: watershed, Mahatma Gandhi National Employment Guarantee Scheme, rural livelihoods program & Rural Electrification and Mid-Day Meal program for primary schools.
Led the design and management of a large (US$250 million) portfolio of programmme on climate resilience and adaptation in South Asia (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal & Pakistan) for UK Department for International Development (DFID).
Designed and implemented participatory monitoring and evaluation approaches and have extensive experience in the area of M&E, performance assessment, result framework and impact assessment for the World Bank, UNDP, DFID, DEFRA, SDC, GIZ, JICA.
Led action research for projects funded by the World Bank, USAID, DFID, UNDP, DECC, JICA, SDC, GIZ, IUCN while working for international NGOs such as Winrock and IIP.
Member of many committees set up by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy in India, and a member of the working group on new and renewable energy set up by ministry to provide inputs for the Twelfth Five Year Plan; member of the taskforce set up by the ministry for ‘enterprise development for promotion of biomass gasifier’ and convenor of the working group formed by the ministry for formulating a 'strategy and action plan for cooking applications under their proposed biomass mission'.

Education

Masters (forest and environmental management), Indian Institute of Forest Management (IIFM), Bhopal, India
Bachelor in science (chemistry honours), Science College, Patna University, India

Current work

Design and implementation of research on social protection programs in Asia region and currently managing research on enhancing climate resilience impacts of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme in India and carrying out scoping and design of Community Resilience Partnership Programme (CRPP) for ADB.