 Distinguished audience, distinguished speakers, I would like to welcome you all to this panel entitled Women Leaders on the Path to Decarbonization. This panel is co-organized by Women in Nuclear Wind Global and the Canadian Nuclear Association, CNA. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Eva Jan. I'm a member of the Wind Global Steering Committee and I'm an experienced nuclear professional having worked at the IAEA for 35 years and six years for the UAE Nuclear Regulator FUNNER on the BARACA project. It is my great pleasure to be back in the UAE for this panel because I considered my second home and I'm happy to moderate this panel. I would also like to express my gratitude to the IAEA for allowing us to co-host this panel at the Pavillion Atoms for Climate. This panel is also being live streamed via the IAEA website so a warm welcome to all those from around the world who are here with us today to watch this panel. The objective of our panel is to highlight the contributions of women driving the global transition to sustainable energy solutions. We have a panel of visionary leaders here today who will share their insights and underscore the significance of gender diversity in the clean energy sector and to discuss also some of the challenges and their potential solutions surrounding gender disparity within the clean energy sector. Not only nuclear but also renewable energies. So we have six distinguished speakers here on our panel who will deliver their insights one by one. We will then have a question and answer session so please hold your questions until all speakers have spoken. First of all, let me welcome Madame Dominique Mouillot, the current president of Wind Global, who will be our first speaker. And let me give you some background information about Dominique. So Dominique Mouillot is a well-recognized business leader in the French nuclear sector. She started her professional career as a chemical high school engineer at the CEA, the Commissariat à l'Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives, leading projects for the French Ministry of Defense and reprocessing plants. She held high positions in the fields of nuclear engineering, nuclear measuring instrumentation and radiation protection. She was also the chief executive officer in prominent French and international groups of the nuclear sector, in particular in the areas of engineering, decommissioning, and nuclear power plant maintenance. She specialized in the creation of joint ventures with important international companies involved in the nuclear industry. Currently, she's working for the Spanish Group of Energy Services, GDES, as the vice president in France. Today, Dominique will highlight wind global activities related to the subject. So let's welcome Dominique Mouillot. Thank you, Eva. Dear ladies and gentlemen, we have gentlemen, which is very pleasant, and dear speakers, let me give you a few words about wind global. Wind global is a non-profit organization of women working professionally in various areas of nuclear energy and radiation applications. We are present in 145 countries, and we have 35,000 members all over the world. Since our foundation in 1992, we have been strong advocates for environmental sustainability, diversity, and gender equality, as well as leadership development of women. To power a thriving, inclusive future for all, we are committed to promote an evidence-based dialogue with the public to raise awareness about the essential contributions of nuclear technology to people and society, especially as part of the solution to the climate crisis, and as a key element to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Climate change affects women and young women in various ways including their health, education, food security, stable homes and families, economic well-being, and even opportunities for leadership. These impacts are closely intervened with existing gender inequalities. Addressing gender dimensions of climate change as Wing Global is doing is essential for building more resilient and equitable societies. Progress is noted in gender equality policies globally, yes. However, policies on plan relocation, displacement, and migration due to climate change effects are often insufficiently gender responsive. More efforts are necessary to redress unequal access to resources across and within communities, hosting displaced women and girls. Additionally, women must be empowered at all economic levels to partake in and benefit from implementing nuclear technology-related projects that aim to mitigate and provide adaptation measures to climate change effects in their home countries. For instance, in South Africa, businesses are encouraged to recruit women first. In this case, this facilitates a fertile business ground for women and it assists women to participate with support from government to parts of business, including the nuclear technology-related business value chain. As wind global, we have established through our local chapters collaboration with the governmental authorities to contribute to promote women to decision-makers' positions to implement the energy policy in the country. Furthermore, we have developed strategic partnerships with several organizations, Women in Renewable Energy, Nuclear Energy Agency, World Nuclear Association, AFCON, Women in Fusion, and IAA, which is extremely supportive, to have common actions and to be more efficient, more visible and exchange opinion. We have, as well, published position paper for the COP 27 and for the COP 28. Climate impacts on women and children need meaningful action. Now, nuclear power can support this action. We are, as well, part of Nuclear for Climate and we have signed the position papers established by these organizations. We have regular events with IAA during the climate change and the role of nuclear power in IAA and during the International Energy Agency, women confront climate change. So we have regular events and it's a way, of course, to talk about this issue and we have one, as well, with African women in Nuclear for Securing Water Resources, for instance, in Africa. Last but not least, we have our own young generation group. Today we have 120 young ladies from 35 countries supporting wind actions, especially in addressing the climate crisis. We conceive the use as change agents and, therefore, they are an active and crucial pillar to build the future of wind global because we need to attract the young talent. Wind global community is convinced that women have a key role to play in the road of decarbonization. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Dominique, and let me come to our second speaker. It's a special pleasure for me to introduce Mr. Enobot Agborot, the Executive Secretary of AFKON, who also happens to be a former colleague of mine from the IAEA. Our offices were right in front of each other. Before joining AFKON in 2022, Mr. Agborot worked at the International Atomic Energy Agency for 32 years in various roles, including on safeguards and the nuclear fuel cycle development. He is an advocate of a multilateral approach to address Africa's energy poverty to contribute to Africa's agenda 2063. Today he will present on the activities of AFKON and also what's going on on the African continent related to gender equality. Mr. Agborot, please, the floor is yours. Thank you. I'm just checking if I'm live. Ladies and gentlemen, let me first of all thank Wing Global for inviting me to participate in this very important panel. The issue that this panel is addressing, I believe, is existential for our race, for humanity. Climate change is an urgent and existential challenge for humanity. Recently Harvard Academic published an award-winning book. I think Elizabeth Colbert and in this book she argues that the world is currently facing the first extinction of species that is not related to external natural forces. At the moment this extinction is mainly affecting other species but if we do not address it urgently, it will eventually lead to our own extinction. About 50% of the world's population is women. If the world has to address this existential threat from climate change we have to deploy all our resources, material resources, human resources, intellectual resources. If women are left out we will be leaving out 50% of our capacity to address the climate change challenge. This is beyond gender equality. This is also about the existence of people on this planet in the long term. This challenge is very important and we cannot deal with it in a mechanistic way. In order to effectively address the issue of climate change, it has to be part and parcel of our culture. It has to be a cultural part. It has to be a cultural thing for us that as we live our lives we are conversant about climate change and we pay attention to it naturally. In all societies of the world, women are the primary caregivers and the teachers are babies and children and the youth from birth until about the mid teens when school becomes in some cases more important than home teaching. But in order for dealing with climate change to be part of our culture we have to rely on women. We have to empower women to teach our babies, our children, our youth our young people so that by the time they become adults it is natural for them to make decisions and do things that mitigate climate change. These young people are the future leaders they are the future decision makers and we have to rely on them to make the right decisions when they are in positions of power. Another aspect that women can contribute to mitigating addressing climate change through relieving women from the I want to say unimportant tasks that the majority of women spend their time their daily lives. In Africa for example firewood we call it biofuels are the main sources of energy in most of our countries 90% of our countries and women spend a disproportionate amount of time every day traveling long distances to collect this biofuel to cook and to supply energy for their families. I'm representing the African Commission on Energy AFKON and one of our flagship projects is to accelerate the achievement by African countries of the infrastructure issues that they need to attain in order to develop nuclear power as part of Africa's energy transition if this comes to pass in the coming years we hope and as we expect that would free up a lot of time for women to address other important issues in our society such as climate change. Here in Africa women are still lagging in policymaking and decision making positions in government and we need to look into that but it's not all bad because in our families at home the people who have the power are women women are the people who manage our homes and our families and I think this is a power that women can leverage to influence political decisions decisions to do with issues such as climate change in government they can use behind the scenes power to start contributing while we are pursuing other avenues of empowering women to be part of the global efforts for climate change mitigation in Africa and my company we have a gender balance policy 50% of our professional program staff are women and we also have that balance here I am here from Africa and the man she's from Africa and she's a woman we have a 50-50 balance here and it's the same balance that we have at our headquarters in Pretoria I just want to end my saying that AFGON is fully behind WIN Global and WIN Africa the youth in nuclear in Africa and you can count on us to support you at your events and to work with you to ensure that our efforts globally to address climate change are inclusive of men and women and the youth and everybody working together to address an existential threat to humanity Thank you Mr. Agborov for highlighting the activities of AFGON and also what's happening on the African continent and for the still a little bit hidden power of women and how we can bring it out a little bit more so thank you very much for that our next speaker will be Ms. Diane Cameron so let me first introduce her briefly Diane Cameron is the head of the Nuclear Technology Development and Economics Division at the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency in NEA in her role at NEA she leads an expert team of economists and scientists in energy policy and nuclear energy policy development amongst NEA member countries by advancing evidence-based authoritative assessments and analysis in the areas of nuclear economics financing and cost reduction as well as nuclear technology, innovation and the nuclear fuel cycle from 2014 to 2021 Diane was the director of the Nuclear Energy Division in Canada as director she headed up the division responsible for leading and coordinating Canadian public policy on nuclear energy and she served as chair of Canada small modular reactor SMR road map and action plan she joined the government of Canada in 2007 to work on energy, environment and economic policy including international relations and negotiations prior to her tenure with the government of Canada she worked in management and consulting and engineering in the private sector specializing in global value chains and international logistics so let's welcome Diane Cameron who will speak about the activities of NEA in the area of gender equality thank you very much for the very kind and thorough introduction I'd like to start by thanking Wynn Global and thanking the CNA Canadian Nuclear Association for organizing this event for inviting me to speak on this topic at the NEA I lead a team that looks at technology, innovation and economics but elsewhere in the agency there is a team of social scientists who prepare a report that I'd like to tell you a little bit about before turning to the report I'd like to also congratulate women in nuclear Canada for taking the significant step this year to join the equal by 30 initiative which is an initiative under the clean energy ministerial that aims to achieve equal pay equal leadership and equal opportunities for women in the global energy transformation by 2030 so congratulations that's an important commitment to have signed on to at the end I'll share some personal remarks on that and some of these other items I'm also very pleased to announce that earlier this year NEA created a Wynn OECD NEA chapter and we've had a lot of energy for that chapter a lot of young women in the agency really driving the work forward so that's been very positive at the agency the NEA under the leadership of director general Bill Magwood has been very active in promoting women to senior positions very active in promoting diversity in the nuclear workforce within the NEA but also in our NEA member countries not only is it the right thing to do but it's also a strategic move as the previous panelist has just explained and I agree wholeheartedly climate change is an existential threat and in order to address climate change and in particular in the nuclear sector in order to triple global installed nuclear by 2050 which is now the call to action from this COP28 to triple global installed nuclear capacity by 2050 we're going to need to increase the talent pipeline on a scale and assuring the scale and quality that we've never had to grow that fast before and that's going to require the young generation it's going to require women not just young women but women mid-career it's going to require talent from the global south it's going to require a new way of thinking about training people and bringing them into the nuclear sector not just straight out of university but also mid-career from other industrial sectors so let me turn to I've got some talking points here about this report it was put together by a group in the NEA agency that really did some fantastic work it essentially is based on the premise that the nuclear sector should reflect the diverse societies that it serves and on gender balance in particular this report finds that women are 25% of the sector's workforce and considerably less than that in the STEM aspects and the leadership roles in the sector it finds that female new hires and promotions are clustered around the non-stem aspects in the sector and based on current trends in hiring and promotion and retention the sector is not on track for gender quality at all by 2030 or 2040 or beyond women are paid less than men in the sector women face negative career impacts from pregnancy and family responsibilities this challenge is not unique to the nuclear sector it exists more broadly but there may be certain characteristics about jobs in the nuclear sector this challenge women working in the sector report experiences of workplace hostility sexual harassment, cultural biases and they report a lack of management and institutional support negative impacts are higher for women in the STEM roles and women from underrepresented communities my relationship to this report is as a consumer colleagues prepared it as a different team I read it with great interest it's a topic that for obvious reasons is very near and dear to my heart as a woman who started in engineering in the early 90s what's really quite interesting about this report and I think probably the most important thing to know about this report is the data collection so there was quantitative data collected from governments and private sector in our member countries and there was also qualitative data collected through surveys and interviews with 8,000 women around the world from our member countries and that sort of sets this analysis apart from some of the other pieces that have been written on this topic in the past I would offer for consideration that policies and measures that are designed to improve gender balance really should not be developed and designed and implemented based on people's hunches and guesses and assumptions are about what the issues are that women face and the reasons why women are underrepresented with better data and better policies and measures with better data and better measures we can break down some of the barriers provide equal opportunities and create workplaces that are free from bias harassment and discrimination and so for that reason I think this report is quite unique because it is based on data that's never been collected before so I encourage you to check it out it's on our website when I read this report you know it's it's disconcerting these findings are troublesome they're troublesome because of ethical reasons but they're also troublesome because of capacity reasons we need women in the workforce but they were not surprising to me nor would I imagine they would be surprising to me as an undergrad in engineering in the early 90s I joined a campaign and the tagline for the campaign was equal by 2000 so a few years ago when I was working in the government of Canada when the government of Canada decided to co-sponsor and launch equal by 2030 under the clean energy ministerial you know yes it was a positive news story but for me on a personal note I had been part of a campaign called equal by 2000 and here I was 30 years later facing the same kind of call to action so the world needs clearly smarter policies and better designed measures if we intend to make more progress on this issue in the next 30 years than we did in the last 30 years and to do that we need data and we need to listen to women and we need to not assume the reasons why women are underrepresented in the sector so thank you for including me in this discussion I look forward to hearing from the other panelists and for providing us with more details of the important report prepared by NEA and I really encourage all of you who are interested in this topic to check it out online and especially to read the recommendations because I believe there's still a lot of work that needs to be done from a personal note I remember when I started my career and I was going on IAEA inspections and I had to dress either in a behind a curtain or in a prayer room because there was just no place for women to put on their working clothes so I think this situation has changed gradually but I think in terms of taking women into account there's still a lot of work to be done so thank you for that so our next speaker is Miss Nicole Butcher from the Ontario Power Generation OPG so Nicole is responsible at OPG for the OPG's generating fleet with a capacity of over 15,600 megawatt consisting of 10 nuclear units, 66 hydro stations two thermal stations and one solar facility she is also responsible for the engineering function integrated fleet management commercial business functions including energy trading commercial contracting and market affairs at OPG In addition, Nicole is the chair of the board of both Eagle Creek Renewables Energy OPG's US hydro subsidiary and the Tura Power OPG's fleet of combined cycle gas plants cycle gas plants in her previous role as senior vice president renewable generation power marketing Nicole was accountable for the operation of hydroelectric and thermal generation in Ontario Nicole held a wide range of roles in OPG including OPG's corporate business development and strategy team focusing on implementing OPG's long term strategic plan including executing on five million dollars of acquisition building and electrification strategy driving an innovation culture at OPG she also worked with Canadian nuclear partners now Laurentis leading a corporate wide business transformation developing the Portland's energy centre in Toronto In 2021, Nicole was named one of Canada's top 100 most powerful women and named women of the year by wire the women in renewable energy and a pro association of power producers of Ontario Nicole, the floor is yours to tell us more about what OPG does in terms of gender parity Thank you, and thank you to Wynn Wynn Canada is an incredible resource for all the women in our organisation they get so much out of their membership with Wynn Canada and they get to see the networking and learning that is provided there so thank you very much for that so a little bit about OPG OPG's mission is to electrify life in one generation so to do that we really have three key strategies that we're relying on one is our climate change plan and our climate change plan really talks about how we can do to grow clean energy in the province and that includes significant nuclear so we do have North America's first SMR under construction I was talking to Deanne about how many dump trucks are going up and down the road right now moving dirt which is fantastic to see so at the end of the day we intend to have a fleet of four SMRs built and then are also looking at building part of our climate change plan but the other two aspects that are equally important to our strategy are equity, diversity and inclusion strategy and our reconciliation action plan so I wanted to spend a bit of time talking about those two pieces because I think they're critical to the discussion here today so our equity, diversity and inclusion plan talks about how we are going to really get to gender parity and maybe a bit of a background on OPG we're doing really well at the senior level so our board of directors is actually 60% women and our senior executive is actually 60% women and I have sort of seen that transition and really the amount of collaboration that we have like it has dramatically changed as you've seen those numbers come up so it is critical that we actually get there because I think we make better decisions when you have a diverse organization where we're not doing so well is really at the shop floor and a lot of the statistics I think Diane was talking about really we're not that far off at that level so we're certainly not celebrating when we need to get to the shop floor and so we are doing things with our growth plan we're obviously hiring a lot of new people so this is our opportunity to actually change what we are, the diversity this is a once in a generation opportunity for us so we're making sure we have diverse panels for interviewing to make sure that we've taken the bias out so that we can really start to change the way we are doing things we have other programs like women in trade so we talked about women in nuclear and having not feeling alone and really having a networking that's important for our women in trades because they are often alone in the nuclear side it's a big station there's lots of people on our hydro side we can often have one woman one trades woman in a station and they very much feel alone and so enabling them to come together having sessions once a year really building the networking and the mentoring so that they know they're not alone they have somebody they can call when they have a challenge and they have a common voice to really advocate on their own for stuff that they need in the organization like change rooms and actually having overalls that are fit for women there's very simple things that they can advocate quite effectively for in the organization so we rely on that a lot we also are really focused on getting women into operating roles which is a challenge you're going on shift it's a different life and so we have a bridging the gap program which really talks to our women engineers and helps them understand what is life like when you go on what we call the program and really get trained as a licensed operator because it's very different and we don't want them dropping out because they didn't understand it and so really encouraging them and knowing that they have a group of women that are supporting them and mentors through that program is critical so those are really the key pieces under our ED&I program that I wanted to focus on a reconciliation action plan for those of you who may not be from Canada I think everyone in Canada probably understands what it is it's really reconciling with our history with our indigenous communities and so it's acknowledging what has happened and then beginning the reconciliation journey and so there's a lot of aspects to that plan including supply chain and having indigenous equity participation in all of our new generation so including nuclear we at the end of the day have an indigenous partner in with us as we build new nuclear but on the employees side it's putting special programs in place to be able to ensure that the indigenous communities understand the opportunities and are trained and so we have an indigenous opportunities in nuclear program ION where we're really trying to bring at the trades level indigenous people and we will train them there's an apprenticeship program and then they either come to work for us or they'll come to work for one of our construction vendors and it's been very successful in bringing indigenous people into our company and we are also starting an apprenticeship program for our hydro facilities our facilities are further up north away from the city density and so therefore the communities themselves are different and have a significant component of indigenous people so we really want to reflect that community in our station employees so bringing them in and giving them opportunities and even if they go back to their community afterwards we know that we've helped that community because we've trained someone to be able to go and do they have trade skills that they can take with them for life so it's an important piece for us and so those are sort of the key elements and we see the ED&I and the reconciliation the RAP as we call it are as critical as our climate change plan and being able to actually get to electrifying life in one generation Mr. Agbor needs to leave us because he has another event he's a bit wired still you can't go so thank you very much Inno for being here with us today thank you so thank you very much Nicole for sharing your experience with OPG and also I really like your background of not just in nuclear but also in the other energy sources I think OPG is doing some important work in terms of gender parity and these policies that are being implemented at the practical level I think that's really important that you are not just aware of the problem but also how do you overcome the challenges and I also of course like the inclusion of Indigenous people which is especially pertinent in Canada and I'm really glad to see this change in Canadian culture two of my grandsons are Canadians so I can fully relate to this so thank you very much for your presentation so we have two more speakers our next speaker is Miss Joanna Osawa she's the Senior Business Development Manager at Burns and McDonald's and she's also the President and CEO of WIRE Women in Renewable Energy Joanna attended Western University studying languages graduating with an Honours Bachelor of Arts she has used these her language skills in a focused 15-plus year management career at leading renewable and energy sector companies in Canada and in the United States by carrying complex projects through many stages she has seen firsthand the vital role renewable energy and emerging technologies serve in moving the Canadian, American and global energy mix forward Joanna has been appointed to the Federal Sustainable Development Advisory Council led by Canada's Minister of Environment and Climate Change Steven Gilbo she looks forward to continuing to engage and contribute to the council's success the council is made up of the Canadian public that represents the views of different provinces and territories indigenous peoples as well as environmental, non-governmental organizations and businesses and labour organizations so Joanna the floor is yours thank you so much for having me here thank you Dominique for partnering with WIRE I'm really happy to have this relationship thank you to CNA so I'm going to start off by letting you folks know I don't have a daughter I don't have children so WIRE is my baby daughter she just celebrated 10 years I'm so proud of her and I'm sure that you know most of people in the stream can relate with their children and I'm saying it's been an emotional ride it's been very happy it's been sometimes strenuous it's been stressful but I am so happy that WIRE has grown into being a young lady that continues to thrive not only on the Canadian market we're in every single province in Canada including the territories Azerbaijan, Turkey, Georgia, Jordan UAE, Africa, UK, Italy our plan next year is to open up in WIRE USA Japan and Iceland and the mission at WIRE is to advance the role and recognition and the underrepresented groups in the energy sector I'm going to talk a little bit about the programs that we have on the Canadian market segment because what's right for Canada may not be right for the UAE or for Jordan or for Africa but we're very closely with our chapter leads to ensure that the correct programming is applicable in those prospective demographics on the Canadian market we bring up networking events so we bring C-suite level folks to come and talk to us about what it is that we do in the energy sector because sometimes unfortunately we sit in silos and it's really great to get together and actually talk about what a design engineer does what an archaeologist does what a geologist does so I think it's really pertinent to make sure that those dialogues and that education is being spoken about we provide field trips as a matter of fact OPG just hosted us two weeks ago at the nuclear power plan and what an educational experience that was and so fantastic I love it because most people don't understand what the difference is between a transmission line versus a distribution line so field trips are impactful we provide speed mentorships speed mentorships are typically done at conferences where we bring decision makers and students or emerging professionals that really want to get into this sector and every 15 minutes they sort of move around it's similar to speed dating someone told me once we do speed interviewing which is very different so I work with the GEs of the world, the Siemens of the world HR will bring me a job description and I'll send up to 20 candidates and talented candidates so they're able to minimize HR hours they're able to shortlist they're able to hire so between speed mentoring and speed networking we've done such a successful job and I've been very proud of the folks that we brought in to the energy sector we provide awards such as the one that was Nicole Butcher was the recipient and most recently Miss Heather Ferguson at Waterpower Canada fantastic job we provide student bursary so students can actually attend conferences and be able to you know talk to decision makers and aggregate market intelligence because again it's such a complicated industry that we're in that it's really important to exchange those conversations we have a huge awards program as I mentioned so not only do we work with clean energy ministerial you know on we did emerging leaders organizational award and also women of the year award within WIRE we do women of Waterpower which Heather was the recipient women of the year award which Nicole received as well women in renewables as well as right now we are developing the women in indigenous leadership award with Canadian Council of Aboriginal Business and we work very closely with indigenous communities not only here on the Canadian side but also on the global side of things we've created many reports as well we work very closely with IRENA out of UAE as well in regards to understanding what that gender impact is and the diversity equity and inclusion is we're actually currently working towards 2024 to actually publish with IRENA and WIRE another really important report one of the things that we are launching or we've launched already is it's a survey called Energize Equity actually on I think it's November December 11th we are hosting a side event here at COP28 to talk about what Energize Equity is it's basically being comfortable talking about the uncomfortable and some of the stories that we're aggregating is for instance well there's a team there's ten engineers on my team I'm the only female and yet I'm always tasked with administrative duties let's talk about those elephants in the room let's make sure that we're understanding what that means our programs are continuously growing thanks to the importance of having sponsors such as OPG we work very closely we have so many different partners it's so important to have partners with charities and non-for-profits that align with our mission of course whether it's skill trades because again if we don't have skill trades we're not building anything let's face it I work with Global Affairs Canada NRCan I work with G7 member states the way that I enter the international markets is precisely I actually provided my intervention at the G7 in 2018 and at the close door event that evening our Prime Minister pulled me aside and said listen I think that the best way for you to actually go enter the international markets is go through the Canadian Constance or the Canadian embassies and I only go into countries that are inviting me to go into otherwise you know again we're a volunteer based organization and we don't have enough resources so we have to be very selective on where we make those impacts as mentioned what's right for Canada may not be right for Africa may not be right for Jordan so we're very very conscious on how we move forward lastly I just want to say that when I started this is like 10 years ago I had a CanRIA the time it was called Canadian Wind Energy Association which is now called CanRIA but at the time I was given a 10 by 10 booth and and I was given a mic and a podium to celebrate wire what happened next was absolutely mind-blowing I had men screaming at me that I was segregating the sexes I had women being telling me that they're there nice sorority I was like what is happening I received hate mail I actually have like two of the hate mail I have them on my wall in my office just as a reminder of how important it is to be able to move forward and most importantly when I get quiet is when I get when I become the most dangerous so I started in Toronto downtown like I said we're in every single province including the territories and my goal is world domination and one day I don't want wire to exist because there will be no longer this conversation to be had and we're working together wholly to advance into net zero and make sure that climate change is successful thank you thank you very much Joanne for sharing your activities of your baby that's very impressive and I strongly believe that nuclear and renewable need to join forces because they complement each other so I'm really happy about our partnership with wire and wind global and I I'm sure there will be some future activities resulting from this partnership so thank you very much for that so our last but not least speaker is Miss Hasna Alblushi from Nawa Energy Company I don't know whether all of you know who Nawa is so I think all of you know ENEC which is the Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation the company that owns the Baraka nuclear power project and Nawa is the operating company so once the unit started becoming operational Nawa was created and some of the ENEC or most of the ENEC staff joined Nawa Hasna is also very active in wind global and let me briefly present her to you so Hasna Alblushi is the nuclear training director in Nawa Energy Company in her role she's leading Nawa in the development and delivery of nuclear professionals to operate and maintain the Baraka nuclear power plants through Nawa Energy Company reliably and efficiently Hasna established the first Baraka women in nuclear wind chapter in the UAE in April 2014 and actually it was in November 2016 that under Hasna's leadership wind global held their annual conference in Abu Dhabi she has also been an advocate for female employees and she has supported their needs within the organization to develop a nuclear power plant are female employers of choice she has demonstrated excellent leadership skills and has quickly adapted to the nuclear model for operations by creating the performance improvement model designing and implementing the training program she became also the INPO international certified nuclear instructor joining Nawa Hasna worked in the healthcare industry and also for the Abu Dhabi national oil company ADNOC in various roles and Hasna is also a member of a number of committees including the health education committee the healthy cities project as well as being the chair of the Baraka wind chapter the first of its kind in the Middle East she is also an executive board member of wind global and Hasna will lead in two days time the establishment of the women in nuclear Middle East chapter so Hasna the floor is yours thank you Eva for welcoming me and allowing me to actually join this panel it's a very important topic for all of us as you mentioned I am the nuclear training director at Nawa energy company for those who don't know Nawa is a subsidiary of nuclear energy cooperation we are the operator and the maintenance of the Baraka nuclear power plants which is our first of a kind nuclear footprint here in the UAE as well as the Middle East honestly I have been very fortunate to join the nuclear energy sector almost 11 plus years back and I was one of the very first females that had joined such a male dominated can I say industry just to give you a little bit of background about the UAE nuclear energy program you know the UAE program started back in 2008 when I had joined it was almost four years old can I say and it started when the UAE's nuclear energy policy was released but the objective was not only to create or to produce clean energy and clean electricity but it was also all about you know securing energy security reducing carbon emission and also to create a sustainable platform of jobs for UAE nationals within the country right at the start honestly capacity building was one big peeler of the nuclear energy program here in the UAE all the way from scholarship programs educational programs developmental programs mentorship creating the women in nuclear chapter within the Baraka spectrum was an excellent platform to actually attract women not only women but also men but mainly women in an aspect that there was a unique platform that was called women in nuclear that was very specific to looking to their needs Ava might have alerted to this a little bit but I am not of a nuclear background I am of a healthcare background so coming into a nuclear industry whereby you know nothing about engineering and how nuclear actually works this job in a nuclear industry was very attractive because it made me open my wings to a new platform that I was not accustomed to learning something that was beyond my even imagination on how this nuclear energy power plant would bring this electricity back to my home and for me to see my electricity bill that is from Baraka and that was really one of the most empowering things that I was really looking forward to until I did see it happen Personally, myself and a lot of the female colleagues wanted to join the UAE's nuclear energy program just because it was new to the country what is this new thing coming up here in the UAE and that excitement created a lot of people to come and think okay there's something new happening it's a new project, there's a lot of hype on it we want to join that industry. Typically, normally in any country this is what happens, people want to go to where the new hype and the new conversation is alerting to but honestly it really offered excellent training programs, one of the things that I went through and almost the company invested in me over over half a million dirhams on just going to bridge my program to get into understanding nuclear power and going through a management certification program on how Baraka really works really working in a simulator and understanding how operators life actually looks like was one of the key transitional key points for myself amongst the many other training programs that I went through but not only that Joana talked a little bit about and mentorship was very important not only did I receive mentorship from male mentors, but also from female mentors, just sitting through mutual conversations of being able to share and to ask openly and transparently and listening to other women's ideas we're always attuned to one style but listening to someone else's style gives you an opportunity to have a light bulb in your mind set and say huh, that was something new to me that I could use but today you know in COP28 you listen to the UAE having a lot of female minister of states and over 50% of the UAE's minister of states are females and within the last few days of COP you probably have heard her excellency Miriam El-Mihiri who is the minister of climate change and environment and her excellency Shemal Mazroori who are the championing role of the young people in tackling climate change. These are examples of not only women at a very very leadership of minister of state cabinet within the UAE but also women like you, like myself who are in the field itself trying to get the work done and trying to have a lot of women get into working as operators as maintenance technicians as chemistry technologists within the Baraka nuclear power plan. So you know when I think about how we could encourage women not only through awarenesses, campaigning the importance of training and mentorship for women within the nuclear energy sector but also being transparent about the challenges that they face and how to overcome those challenges. Because a lot of people want to talk about the positives in nuclear. Well there's also the other side of the house that we need to consider. It's always always young, it's always easier for women who are young who have not yet established their families to get into nuclear and it's always easier for women who have got teenage children and upwards getting into nuclear. It's interesting how the transition phase is always very tricky, who are women trying to build their families at a start with very young children and how to cope with that mechanism is very very critical. And I want to say at a personal level, you know with Nawa Energy Company and Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation when I joined I had a four month old daughter and a two year old son and a four year old son all that were very very young as I joined Nuclear and Boracca was around three hours away from my house so the company had created a lot of important infrastructures to make my work and my home life very easy. Things that we saw for working very remotely was having affordable living accommodations that were female suited. What works for a man doesn't necessarily work for a woman in a lot of the what they call it in a lot of the situations. Creating policies and legislations within the company such as nursing hours, allowing remote work which we used when I had a son sick I would say hey could I work remotely today and my boss would be that's fine you're within a lot with having to deal with the night fever that came up or with the running flu that came up on that day. Important policies were about nursing hours and equal pay. I talk about personal experience because I've lived through this and I've been fortunate to work in a company that supports women's role and women equality in a nuclear industry such as the Boracca nuclear power plant here in the UAE. So thank you for having me here today. Appreciate it. Thank you very much Hasna for sharing both your personal and the UAE experience as somebody who has worked in this country for several years I can certify that the UAE really has a strong policy to support women and actually in the federal authority for nuclear regulation where I was working the nuclear regulator almost 50% of the staff are women. Congratulations on that. I'm just looking at the time and I'm looking at Antonio Antonio in the background. We are a little bit over time so let me open the floor to any questions and answers. Do you have any questions to any of the panelists from the audience or any comments or anything you would like to share? Yes, please. Thank you. Thank you so much for sharing all of your stories. I think it's so important to hear the different perspectives from the industry. What is the one thing if you could say that you want you think the industry needs to action to make a change? What is the one thing that you would recommend we do? Like to respond or let me just hand over the microphone from one to one. What's the most important thing from three to be done? I think that the most important thing is really to attract young people. To attract them to federate them to develop mentoring. What we do in WIN Global we have a mentoring platform to give classes of leadership development to involve them in our actions and really to build the bridges between the generations. So as I want to leave the microphone to my colleagues I would say that for me it's the most important to attract young people and young talents. Yeah, okay great. I'm going to cheat. There's two things. One is sort of the agency message which is data and interviews and listening to women and collecting data because better data leads to better policies so that we're tailoring policies and measures to what the actual impediments are. But I also want to plant a seed just, this is more of a personal comment which is that it's not just about designing flexibility for women. It's also about providing flexibility and maybe changing the expectations for men in the environment. So we know that when men start taking parental leave then it starts to change the roles at home and it starts to create a possibility for women at work so it actually is not just about tailoring measures for women and introducing flexibility for women it's also about looking at the measures and the expectations that are being placed on men. Do men who take parental leave and this is worth collecting data one of the questions I would ask is do men who take parental leave face disadvantages when they're up for promotion? What are the expectations on men? Because those two things go hand in hand. Yeah, I guess I would say one thing is to take a risk. So the women may not like the people that you've always hired into that position it may be very different and that's okay let them step up really take a risk on them let them flourish in a job and support them. And from a women's perspective be willing to take that risk and step out and see if you can do something and accelerate because I think we're not going to change things quickly if we don't start putting different people who may have different backgrounds into roles and really get that built up. Thank you. Let me bring the microphone here. I want to see women at the executive level but more importantly also at the board of directors level I think that that's extremely important. McKinsey published a report last year where it showed that 5% of women from the 500 fortune companies are actually at the top level. We need every single person at that table included in women and underrepresented groups. I can tell you when WIRE international gets together whenever we have an obstacle I can't tell you how quickly we're able to resolve a problem. Thank you. Thank you Joanna. I would honestly say that breaking down barriers and can I say advancement of women that's probably the main thing and it's not only it should be at all levels. Okay? You'd always find that certain roles or we don't want to have women in that role is very difficult like a local operator having to move and work with pumps and everything. Well why not? They are women who like to work vocational work with their hands so I think breaking down those barriers and having to advance women in different levels and in different roles would be something that we should be working at. Okay. Thank you very much. I'm looking at the time and I think we are running a little bit over time so let me quickly wrap up. First of all a big thank you to all the panelists and in summary I would like to say that I think we are really at the crucial time in history if we want to implement this tripling nuclear power generation by 2050 I think we also need to triple our human capacities in order to fulfill that program apart from all the other things that will be necessary to do so so as Inno has highlighted and all of you have mentioned women just cannot be ignored I think as has also been mentioned we all have a role to play the older generation amongst us to pass on our knowledge to the youngsters to show them the right way to share our experiences with them and for the young generation to be open not to be shy to step up to us and seek advice whenever you need it just feel free to ask any questions you have and those at the middle level we all need to support each other we need to support each other that's really crucial for women and for the nuclear industry in general so thank you very much and thanks again to the IAEA for hosting this panel and for the audience can we have a group photo?