Rajendra Shende

In 2006 he was felicitated by President of India Dr. Abdul Kalam for his role in development of the solar vaccine cooler for the poor, rural and remote communities.

He served as Review Editor for the IPCC Special report on Technology Transfer in 2000 and was a Coordinating Lead Author for the IPCC/TEAP special report on Safeguarding the Ozone layer and Global Climate System in 2005. The work of the IPCC, including the contributions of many scientists, was recognised by the joint award of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.

In 1999 he was elevated as Chief of Energy and OzonAction Unit, when he initiated for the first time in the UNEP Division of Technology, Industry and Economics, he initiated the Energy and Climate Programme. He organized workshops on Clean Development Mechanism in more than 20 countries under the Kyoto Protocol. In 2004 he was appointed to become the Head of the expanded OzonAction Branch, to lead the 11 regional and sub-regional networks of 146 National Ozone officers from as many developing countries from UNEP's 5 offices in Bangkok, Bahrain, Nairobi, Paris, Panama city for the global programme for safeguarding the ozone layer and the climate system to get climate mitigation benefits as well as ozone layer protection from the implementation of the Montreal Protocol.

Shende after his Chemical Engineering from IIT, began his career with Tata Chemicals, Mithapur, India as Production Engineer in the chemical complex manufacturing chemicals from Sea water. In 1978 he joined Hindustan Organic Chemicals, a Government of India Undertaking which was engaged in the manufacture of Organic Chemicals. He led the project team to set up the first ever Polytetrafluroethylene (PTFE) manufacturing facility in India. In 1988 he was nominated by the Government of India on the National Task Force to carve out India's strategy leading towards its ratification of the Montreal Protocol. Later, he was part of the India's international negotiating team for establishing the financial mechanism for the implementation of the Multilateral Fund for the implementation of Montreal Protocol on the substances that deplete the Ozone Layer. In that capacity he attended most of the negotiations and the international UN meetings on the Montreal Protocol from 1989. In 1992, he was selected to lead the OzonAction Programme of United Nations Environment Programme to enable 146 developing countries to comply with the Montreal Protocol. In year 2010, all the developing countries successfully phased out Chloroflurocarbons (CFCs) and other Ozone Depleting Substances, making Montreal Protocol as ‘one of the most successful international agreement so far’ as per former United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan.

Rajendra Shende was born and educated in Rahimatpur, a small rural and agricultural town in Satara district of India. He came to Mumbai in 1964 for his college education and succeeded in getting admission, through highly competitive entrance examination, in the Indian Institute of Technology from where he was awarded graduate degree in Chemical Engineering in 1972. Before being selected for international civil service in United Nations, he served in the Indian private sector and the government companies that included Tata Chemicals and SRF in their production, projects and strategic diversification units. After his retirement from UN, Shende spends his time in India and France where he lives in his town Rahimatpur, Pune and Paris. Shende is strong believer in practicing what one preaches.

Rajendra Madhavrao Shende (born 13 July 1949), an alumnus of Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) and former Director in United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), is currently serving as the Chairman of TERRE Policy Centre which is a not-for-profit organization engaged in the policy development and project based advocacy on the sustainable development. Before August 2011, he was the Head of the OzonAction Branch of the United Nations Environment Programme, Division of the Technology, Industry and Economics (UNEP DTIE) in Paris.