{"id":7852,"date":"2026-03-07T09:41:41","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T07:41:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/?p=7852"},"modified":"2026-03-07T11:18:54","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T09:18:54","slug":"c%c2%b7i%c2%b7b-alumnus-elected-to-ipbes-expert-panel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/c%c2%b7i%c2%b7b-alumnus-elected-to-ipbes-expert-panel\/","title":{"rendered":"C\u00b7I\u00b7B alumnus elected to IPBES expert panel"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dr Sebataolo (Seb) Rahlao, an alumnus of the Centre for Invasion Biology (C\u00b7I\u00b7B), has been elected to the Multidisciplinary Expert Panel (MEP) of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES).<\/a> His appointment was announced during the twelfth session of the IPBES Plenary held in Manchester, United Kingdom, last month.\u00a0Dr Rahlao will serve on the panel until 2029.<\/p>\n

The IPBES Multidisciplinary Expert Panel<\/a> plays a central role in guiding the organisation\u2019s scientific work. Its mandate is to provide scientific and technical advice to the IPBES Plenary, assisting with scientific and technical communication, overseeing the peer-review process to ensure high-quality assessments, and engaging with the global scientific community and other knowledge holders to support IPBES\u2019 work.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Dr Rahlao serves currently as Executive Manager of the Oceanographic Research Institute (ORI),<\/a> a research division of the South African Association for Marine Biological Research (SAAMBR)<\/a>. Here Dr Rahlao leads a team of scientists conducting research on coastal zones, coral reefs, fisheries, estuaries, and marine protected areas (MPAs), with a focus on the KwaZulu-Natal coast, the Western Indian Ocean, and global marine systems.<\/p>\n

Dr Rahlao is also a Research Associate at the Centre for Invasion Biology at Stellenbosch University, where he completed his PhD in 2009.<\/p>\n

Over the course of his career, Dr Rahlao has built an extensive track record in biodiversity research leadership, working across terrestrial and marine systems and strengthening the science-policy interface.<\/p>\n

He also has extensive international experience within IPBES. He briefly served as a Lead Author of the ongoing Second Global Assessment, previously contributed as a Lead Author of the Africa Regional Assessment, and was a Coordinating Lead Author of the Invasive Alien Species Assessment.<\/p>\n

Beyond biodiversity assessments, Dr Rahlao has contributed to global climate diplomacy, providing support to South Africa\u2019s climate change negotiators during three United Nations climate conferences: COP16 in Canc\u00fan, COP17 in Durban, and COP18 in Doha.<\/p>\n

Congratulations, Dr Rahlao!<\/p>\n

For more information about the IPBES Multidisciplinary Expert Panel: https:\/\/www.ipbes.net\/multidisciplinary-expert-panel<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

C\u00b7I\u00b7B alumnus elected to IPBES expert panel<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11009,"featured_media":7858,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"0","ocean_second_sidebar":"0","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"0","ocean_custom_header_template":"0","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"0","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[86053,3256],"tags":[8802,2482,71693,86083],"class_list":["post-7852","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-86053","category-news","tag-biodiversity","tag-invasive-species","tag-ipbes","tag-science-policy-interface","entry","has-media"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7852","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11009"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7852"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7852\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7873,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7852\/revisions\/7873"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sun.ac.za\/cib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}