Pillar II: Knowledge Cooperation

Mr. Oliemans draws on 25 years of professional experience in the Netherlands and abroad. Starting from a background in Land and Water Management (MSc) he combines expertise in irrigation and drainage development with river basin management and environmental management. Building on further education in Business Administration (Dipl.) he has strongly developed skills in project management and project cycle management. Besides his work as an expert advisor in integrated water resource management in Deltares, Mr. Oliemans also acts as an independent quality reviewer (water management) for the International Fund for Agricultural Development. He has worked in over 20 countries as a project leader and water management advisor for a variety of clients in the private, public, and NGO sectors. Mr. Oliemans has completed long-term assignments abroad in Pakistan, Peru, Egypt, and Turkey and short-term assignments in Albania, Armenia, Croatia, Macedonia, Romania, Spain, the Netherlands, Morocco, Jordan, Egypt, Botswana, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Mozambique, Rwanda, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Turkey, Ecuador, Peru, and Nicaragua.

Sonja Pans is an expert in environmental impact assessment with international experience in South East Asia, the Middle East, Europe, and North America. She has many years of experience in executing and managing multi-disciplinary and multi-stakeholder projects often with conflicting objectives. Her expertise lies predominately in coastal areas where activities compete for space and resources. She has guided many (strategic) environmental impact assessments in South East Asia and the Middle East related to dredging, land reclamation, and port/jetty development. These studies addressed physical processes (hydrodynamic, waves, morphology, sediment plumes), water quality, and ecology along with the necessary methodology for field instrumentation, fieldwork protocols, and the use of different numeric modeling techniques. Often these environmental impact assessments resulted in environmental monitoring and measurement plan during execution requiring close collaboration with authorities, clients, and dredging companies. Extensive work with the renewable energy industry (wave, tidal, offshore wind) only deepened her understanding of coastal zone management and marine spatial planning in form of siting studies using advanced numerical models, understanding of coastal processes, habitat modeling for birds and marine mammals among other for the Crown Estate and the Offshore Renewables Joint Industry Programme (ORJIP). In the traditional energy sector, she worked with the environmental risk associated with oil spills (State of Michigan), flood risks associated with extreme weather events, and pipeline studies. Sonja Pan's background in industrial engineering and management and applied environmental measurement techniques gives her a wide foundation in understanding pathways of environmental impacts both in industrial and spatial planning contexts paired with a thorough understanding of commercial/economic aspects. Sonja Pans supported several commercial clients in Singapore, Vietnam, and Qatar as well as several industrial clients in the Netherlands and Ukraine with master planning, due diligence, and environmental permitting with respect to environmental aspects ranging from air, soil, and (ground)water as well as external safety, noise, energy efficiency, and sustainability considerations.

Marona 5 years of professional experience. She graduated from King’s College London and the SOAS University of London focussing on EU – MENA relations in the field of development, specifically regarding gender. Her background is based on international cooperation between multinational organizations and projects. She has work experience with the Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation, working closely with the Planning Sector on various projects. As well Egypt, she has also worked in the UK and Germany. She is fluent in Arabic and native in English and German.