Participants

Frans Timmermans is the Executive Vice-President of the European Commission for the European Green Deal and European Commissioner for Climate Action since 2019. Between 2014 and 2019, he served as First Vice-President of the EU Commission, in charge of Better Regulation, Inter-Institutional Relations, the Rule of Law and the Charter of Fundamental Rights.

Mr Timmermans was Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands from 2012 to 2014 and State Secretary for Foreign Affairs from 2007 to 2010, in charge of European Affairs. Prior to his political activity as a member of the Dutch House of Representatives for the Labour Party, he worked in the diplomatic service of the Netherlands.

Mr Frans Timmermans holds a bachelor’s degree in French language and literature from Radboud University and Postgraduate courses in European Law and French Literature from the University of Nancy.

Michaela Karamperi is an EU policy analyst and coordinator of the Rethinking our Economy programme in Generation Climate Europe. Prior to this, she completed a traineeship at the European Commission and conducted research on fair and environmental taxation at the Institute for European Environmental Policy. She is passionate about system change and post-growth economies and holds a BSc in Political Science and an MSc in International Development with a focus on environmental policy.
 

Alba Mullen, a sustainable fashion advocate, is passionate about the power of targeted regulation in addressing the climate crisis. As a trained environmental economist Alba has specialised insight into the mechanisms through which climate policy can drive our communities towards a more resilient future. She advocates for taking the pressure off citizens and instead promotes an economic model that internalises pollution and environmental damage. When not communicating on this topic, Alba works as a policy analyst with a focus on EU sustainable fiscal regulation.

Ivo Wakounig is currently finishing his master’s degree in Sustainable Development in Utrecht University, NL, and he will start his PhD at TU Eindhoven, NL in October 2023. He is specialising in the transformative capacity of energy & climate policy and he is an expert in the financing strategies of the European Green Deal. Next to his studies, Ivo is also Future Energy Leader of World Energy Council, World Energy Council Netherlands, and Senior Advisor at World Energy Council Austria. Ivo regularly publishes (blog) articles on emerging topics regarding energy transitions, youth engagement, and climate action. 

Josh Oxby is an international just transition consultant, author and (Scottish) Climate and Energy policy advisor, working out of the University of Strathclyde, completing his PhD on the Scottish just 2045 jobs and skills net-zero landscape. Currently on secondment to an international inter-governmental organisation as a People-Centred Energy Analyst, he is also an active UN Sustainable Development Goals and Youth Advisor for energy initiatives across Europe and North America.

Maria Magdalena Szczerbowska is a member of European Youth Parliament Poland and AEGEE Europe. As a Highly Sensitive Person, she has always been concerned about social equality and global development. Currently, her interests involve neurosciences, economy of values and human-centered technologies which she studies in a free time. Apart from that, Maria Magdalena enjoys singing and creating voice-overs as well as active participation in non-governmental initiatives.

Phoebe L. Hanson is a climate advocate who co-coordinates Mock COP, a youth climate conference engaging youth from over 140 countries. At COP26, she co-convened a Presidency ministerial event on climate education, and at COP27, she managed digital content for the first Children and Youth Pavilion. She has reached thousands of young people, business leaders, and political figures.

Giacomo Zattini has been a climate activist since 2019, when he founded the local Fridays For Future group in his hometown and organised the Global Climate Strikes, involving thousands of people. He is currently co-spokesperson of Fridays For Future Italy. During his studies in International Relations, he attended COP26 and COP27 as a youth delegate. He is always looking for new ways to spread environmental awareness among citizens of all ages and push Italian and European politicians to respect the planet's natural limits, following the principles of just transition.

Theo Cullen-Mouze is a 20 year old climate activist and organiser from a small rural island off the West coast of Ireland. He has been an active member of Fridays for Future and the broader youth climat justice movement since 2019 and previously attended both COP25 and COP26 as a youth delegate. Theo is committed to the principles of climate justice and has been consistently fighting for greater climate ambition at a national, European, and international level.

Letizia Bombardieri graduated in philosophy in Italy, and studies social policy at SciencesPo Paris. Always engaged with different non-profit social organizations, the deep interrelation between social inequalities and environmental unsustainability make her focus on how the environmental transition can promote human dignity for all, in the present and in the future. In particular, she believes in the role of the welfare state in assuring human flourishing within planetary boundaries.

Szmo Kacprzak graduated from Social Project Management at the University of Wroclaw. Since 2019 he has been an activist in the Młodzieżowy Strajk Klimatyczny (Fridays For Future Poland). He is credited with coordinating nationwide climate strikes, leading numerous campaigns and civil disobedience actions. His main field of interest is: energy transition and corporate responsibility in the context of the climate crisis. A lover of dachshunds.

Julien Wald is a 22-year-old European Law student at Maastricht University in the Netherlands. Since 2017, he has been an active member of several youth organisations, where he has advocated for human rights, sustainability, and youth policy. As an activist in Youth for Climate Luxembourg, he has pushed for political action on a national and European level. In 2023, he got the position of UN Youth Delegate for Luxembourg, where he represents and promotes the views of the younger generation.

Katrīna Leitane has almost 10 years of experience in the youth field when she started as a volunteer in a local youth centre and now a member of the EESC. She participated in Erasmus trainings and had developed several Erasmus+ projects concerning youth participation. Now, she is looking forward to involving more youth in the EESC and establishing fruitful cooperation aiming to improve the life quality of youth in the EU. She is the President of the Coordination Group for the European Year of Youth. She is the Rap of the EESC Opinion on the EU Youth Test. is Alumni of the Young Elected Politicians 2020 programme launched by the Committee of Regions; Member of the Nation Working Group for the European Union Youth Dialogue and the National Working Group for the European Year of Youth, Ministry of Education and Science of Latvia.

Nicoletta Merlo is National Head of Youth Policies for CISL, one of the largest Italian trade union confederations, and represents her confederation on the Italian National Youth Council. In 2017 she started a European experience in the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), which led her to be elected as a member of the Bureau of the ETUC Youth Committee for the 2019-2021 mandate. Since October 2020, she has been a member of the European Economic and Social Committee and actively participates in the SOC and NAT sections, in the Labour Market Observatory and in the ad hoc group for the European Year of Youth, seeking to be spokesperson for the demands and needs of young people and promoting the inclusion of a generational perspective in the Committee's discussions and multiple activities.

Sandra Parthie Head of Brussels Office/ Head of European Affairs of the German Economic Institute (IW Köln) and president of the EESC’s Section on the Internal Market, Production and Consumption (INT).
Sandra studied political sciences and economics at the Freie Universität in Berlin, Germany and the Université de Montréal, Canada. 
From 2006-2011 she was the head of office and political advisor to a German Member of the European Parliament and Chair of the Environment Committee. Her work focus was on environment, climate and energy policy. In 2011 she joined French-multinational company Alstom as the Director for EU Regulatory Affairs, with a focus on renewable energies and grid technology. Since March 2015 she is running the Brussels Liaison office for private German economic think tank ‘IW’ (Institut der deutschen Wirtschaft/ German Economic Institute).
Since 2020 she is a member of EESC, in the INT and SOC section and had i.a. drafted the EESC opinions on strategic foresight in 2021 and 2022 as well as opinions on EU industrial policy and strategic autonomy.