Yulia Kuleshova has nine years
experience in the management of projects related to nature conservation and
environment. Her current position is Russia’s coordinator for the WRI project
“Landscape Impact Assessment of the Oil and Gas Industry in Russia”. This
project is aimed to quantify and communicate the footprint of the oil and gas
industry on Russia’s landscape. In its first phase the project will develop a
consistent and independent assessment method based on information available in
the public domain and primarily satellite imagery. The assessment team consists
of Russian environmental NGOs: International Social Ecological Union, Greenpeace
Russia, WWF Russia, Transparent World, and Crude Accountability.
In 1997-2005 Yulia worked with a number of Russian environmental NGOs (Biodiversity
Conservation Center, IUCN Office for Russia and CIS, Greenpeace Russia, Russian
Regional Environmental Centre) implementing projects in the field of protected
areas, ecological networks, environmental education, and renewable energy. Her
responsibilities included project design, fundraising, administration and
communication; organization of seminars and trainings; coordination of volunteer
work etc. She was manager and co-editor of several environmental publications,
including a series of popular brochures “for Children and Ministers”, the
Russian edition of the Best Practice Protected Area Guidelines Series,
“Development of Russian Protected Areas: 1992-2003”, “Playing on Behalf of the
Mountain Life”. In 2000-2005 Yulia was co-editor of The Open Country, an
international publication dedicated to understanding and conservation of
grassland communities.
Ms. Kuleshova holds Master’s degree in Geography from Moscow Lomonosov State
University. In 1995-1996 she took postgraduate courses at Wageningen
Agricultural University and at the University of Ghent. She is fluent in English
and conversant in Spanish.
Yulia was born in Irkutsk (Eastern Siberia). Her personal interests include
cross-cultural communication, nature interpretation and singing.