The Cropper Foundation

Board, Staff & Associates


	Our Board
			Angela Cropper President Angela graduated from the University of the West Indies with BSc Economics (Hons.) and LL.B (Hons.). Angela’s career in development policy and practice has been at the Caribbean and Global levels. Now retired form institutional employment, she continues to be actively involved globally, in volunteer positions, in sustainable development policy analysis and synthesis, governance and institutional reforms through a variety of international organizations and through the Foundation. In 2005, Angela was appointed by the President of Trinidad and Tobago as an Independent Senator in the Parliament. Most recently, Angela was named as the Assistant Secretary-General and Deputy Executive Director for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). She took up those responsibilities in February 2008.

			Neera Shanti Lakhan Secretary/Treasurer Neera Shanti had her early education in Trinidad and then at UWI, Trinidad and Barbados campuses, from which she graduated in 1982 with LL.B Honours. She then obtained her Certificate of Legal Practice at the Sir Hugh Wooding Law School in Trinidad. Since then she has practiced at the local Bar and in the Corporate sector as legal advisor to several business groups. She recently retired as Corporate Secretary to RBTT Corporation.

			Jusice Ulric Cross Ulric had a distinguished and much decorated career in the British Royal Air Force as Bomber Command Navigator where he attained the rank of Squadron Leader during World Way II and in the legal and judicial profession within his native T&T, in Ghana, Cameroon, Tanzania and in the East African regional entities. He has also served in the T&T public service, as BBC radio talk show host, in academia in various countries and as High Commissioner to the UK for T&T and Ambassador to several European countries. Ulric is now retired but continues to carry out judicial functions in private arbitrations and through various public entities such as Media Complaints Council of T&T. He is a also a Member of the Board of the Cotton Tree Foundation, a charitable organization offering education support and opportunity to children within a disadvantaged community. Justice Cross was honoured in 2006 at an annual Icon Recognition Ceremony for his contribution to the development of T&T and betterment of the people.

			Norman Girvan Norman Girvan is a Professorial Research Fellow with the UWI Institute of International Relations (UWI_IIR). His research interest is mainly in Regional Integration; CARICOM Single Market and Economy; History of Caribbean Economic Thought. He is also currently a Member of the Board of the South Centre; Formerly Secretary General, Association of Caribbean States; University Director, Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies; Professor of Development Studies, University of the West Indies; and had provided considerable public service in Jamaica and the Caribbean.

			Neera Lakhan

			Sheilah Solomon Sheilah had her formal education at the University of the West Indies, Jamaica and Oxford University, UK. She was an early ambassador for the Caribbean, having served among the first cohort of diplomats of the West Indies Federal Government in postings in Washington D.C. and New York. Sheilah has also had a long tenure as Secretary –General of the National Commission for UNESCO for T&T and then at UNESCO Headquarters as Director of its Bureau for Field Offices. Since retirement she has continued to be active in pursuing a dream of unified Caribbean. In 1993 she founded T&T CAN !(Citizens’ Agenda Network) a not for profit volunteer organization as a vehicle for analyzing, advocating and mobilizing towards more meaningful involvement of people in the affairs of the region. She functions as the Coordinator of T&T CAN! Sheilah is of Jamaican origin and is a citizen of T&T and currently lives in T&T.

			Gary Voss Gary was born in Trinidad in 1945 and received his early schooling in Trinidad and Barbados before attending Birmingham University, England, where he graduated in 1967 with a B.Sc. (Hons.), Chemical Engineering. On his return to Trinidad, he joined Texaco Trinidad Inc. at their Pointe a Pierre refinery. His career continued to take him on journey through various positions within the industrial sector, from the Caribbean Industrial Research Institute (CARIRI), to ISCOTT, the new steel mill Unilever, as Technical Director of Lever Brothers West Indies Ltd at Champs Fleurs in Trinidad. In 1987 he was appointed Chairman and Managing Director, positions he held until his retirement at the end of 2001, retaining however the position of non-executive Chairman. Gary Voss is a director of RBTT Financial Holdings Ltd., Guardian Holdings Ltd. and DFL Caribbean Ltd., as well as a number of the subsidiaries of these companies, and is also Chairman of SuperPharm Ltd. He is also a past President of the T&T Manufacturers Association and the Caribbean Association of Industry & Commerce.

			Dr. Daniela Lyndersay Dani was born in Australia of Dutch, Swiss, Irish and Canadian heritage and is a puppeteer, mask maker, actress and poet who has lived, traveled and worked in many parts of the world including Israel, Nigeria and Europe. Trinidad is now her home where she is a Senior Lecturer and the Coordinator of Theatre Arts at the Centre for Creative & Festival Arts at the University of the West Indies. She joined the Board in May 2004 and heads the Foundation’s programme in Support of Caribbean Writers.

			Winston Rudder Winston is a citizen of Trinidad and Tobago who has approximately forty years experience in development policy, programming and operations at national, regional and international levels. His key responsibilities and assignments over that period include managing local and national agricultural and integrated rural development projects; developing and directing a national agricultural planning system; advising on national and regional agricultural development policy; providing strategic leadership, guidance and management in three government ministries; building constituencies of interest across the public-private sector divide; negotiating with and undertaking international development-oriented assignments for multilateral institutions; serving as representative of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), in South Asia and the Caribbean; reorienting FAO’s programmatic interventions to more fully accommodate gender and sustainability considerations; managing FAO’s post-tsunami agricultural, fisheries and related relief and recovery support activities in the Maldives. Winston’s interest is to remain active in development nationally and internationally, retaining a focus on people-related issues and challenges and ensuring that equity and social justice inform choices and responses. (Copied from the website for the Board of Women Organizing for Change in Agriculture and NRM where he is Vice-Chairperson www.wocan.org/about-board.html)

			Dennis Pantin He is Head of the Economics Department of the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, and Co-ordinator of the recently formed (1996) research cluster in this Department on Sustainable Economic Development in Small & Island Developing States, the Sustainable Economic Development Unit (SEDU). He also teaches an undergraduate course on Resource and Environmental Economics and supervises several graduate students on the theme of sustainable tourism development. Dennis continues to conduct research in the area and has several publications relating to sustainable development.

			Dr. John Agard John is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Life Sciences of the University of the West Indies in St. Augustine Trinidad and Tobago. He also serves as the Chairman of the Board of Directors of Environmental Management Authority of Trinidad & Tobago since 1997. John has several publications and is actively involved in research in the areas of pollution impacts on marine benthic and plankton biodiversity and ecosystem function; environmental physiology and ecotoxicology of tropical marine species; the role of biodiversity in marine ecosystem function and assessment of the vulnerability of the natural environment in Trinidad & Tobago.

	Our Staff
			Sarika Maharaj Programme Officer - Community Technical Assistance Programme Sarika joined the Foundation in 2003 as a key member of the Northern Range Assessment team, and this provided an opportunity for her to contribute to the global Millennium Ecosystem Assessment as an author on the Sub-global Chapter that focused on Policy Responses. From May 2004 to May 2006, she served as Project Officer for the Bon Air North Sustainable Living Project, which built on her experience while undertaking her MSc. research project in Environmental Sciences at the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine. Sarika has a BSc. in Zoology and began her career in geology, working off-shore in the exploration of oil and gas before doing her masters degree. She has since consciously sought to re-orient her professional focus, and build her experience in the area of community development and natural resource management. Sarika now works with the President to build the Foundation’s Programme that provides technical support to communities, while undertaking and supporting other initiatives that follow-up from the Northern Range Assessment.

			Simone Dieffenthaller Programme Officer - Integrated Management of the Caribbean Sea Simone has an M.Sc in Conservation Biology from the Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology, University of Kent. She joined the Foundation in September 2006, working jointly on the CARSEA Follow-up project and the Education programme. Her special interest is 'Biodiversity Conservation in the context of Sustainable Development.'

			Keisha Garcia Programme Officer - Ecosystem Assessment and Education Keisha has an M.Phil from the University of the West Indies in Zoology and one in Environment and Development from the University of Cambridge. She joined the Foundation in October, 2002 to co-ordinate a socio-economic assessment of Trinidad's Northern Range as a sub-global assessment in the context of the Millennium Assessment. She has a special interest in public education on environmental issues. Keisha has penned her thoughts on her time with the Foundation under the following: The Cropper Foundation's contribution to my development - Reflections by Keisha