Maliha lead’s the climate change portfolio at UNDP and has been working on developing a substantive innovative financing portfolio within the Resilience and Inclusive Growth (RIG) cluster; integrating innovation into climate change solutions and governance; and promoting UNDP’s thought leadership on climate change. She has led programs on climate finance governance and provided technical support to ensure that gender equality and human rights are incorporated for the effective delivery of climate change investments.

Maliha has 15 years of experience on climate change adaptation, low carbon resilient development, food security, sustainable food systems, energy systems transformation, sustainable development, and the political economy of development in Bangladesh. Maliha was previously a Research Fellow at Chatham House, the Royal Institute of International Affairs, on climate change, food systems, food security in the post covid world, biodiversity, and land-use change.

She has also worked for UNDP Bangladesh as a Climate Finance Expert consultant on the Integrated National Financing Framework for Accelerating Achievement of Sustainable Development Goals contributing to the update of the Development Finance Assessment and was responsible for the formulation of the SDG 13 Financing Strategy.

She was based at the Environmental Change Institute of the University of Oxford for over 7 years as a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow and CCAFS South Asia Regional Coordinator, exploring participatory foresight methods to analyze the impact of climate change on food systems, with special attention to synergies and trade-offs in terms of nutritional, environmental and equity outcomes. She has also worked in various policy research institutes including the International Institute of Environment and Development, the Overseas Development Institute, and the Stakeholder Forum in the UK. She started her career with BRAC in Bangladesh.

Maliha has a PhD on the Political Economy of Low Carbon, Climate Resilient Development from SOAS, University of London. Her research examined the opportunities and barriers for low carbon, climate resilient pathways in the energy and agriculture sectors of Bangladesh. She also holds a MSc in Environment, Politics and Globalization from King’s College London and a BSc in Environmental Science.