Aliyu Salisu Barau

Aliyu Salisu Barau is a Nigerian academic and a professor of Urban and Regional Planning at Bayero University Kano. He served as the Dean of the Faculty of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Bayero University Kano from 2023 to 2025 and is the West Africa Hub Director of the Urban Climate Change Research Network (UCCRN), affiliated with the Earth Institute, Columbia University. He is also a Chartered Town Planner of the UK's Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI).

Education Aliyu Salisu Barau obtained his Bachelor's degree in Geography in 1999, and a Master's degree in Land Resources in 2008, both from Bayero University Kano. He received his doctorate degree from the University of Technology Malaysia (UTM) in 2015.

Career

Dean, Faculty of Earth and Environmental Sciences/ Member of the University Management Committee/Member of the Senate. Bayero University Kano (Since March, 2023). Director West Africa Hub, Urban Climate Change Research Network (UCCRN) affiliated with Earth Institute, Columbia University, New York appointed 2020. Alternate Member, Multidisciplinary Experts Panel: Intergovernmental Platform for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services Science and Policy (IPBES) IPBES Secretariat Bonn Germany. Member of the IPCC Scientific Steering Committee for the Cities and Climate Change International Scientific Conference. This is the first IPCC meeting on cities and climate change held in 2018 in Edmonton, Canada. The conference aims to feed into IPCC AR7 Special Report on Cities and Climate Change. Commission Member: International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN's) World Commission on Protected Areas (with concurrent role in Climate change, Governance of Protected and Conserved Areas, Urban Conservation Strategies networks) – 2018–2021 reappointed 2021–2025. Environmental Advocacy for fostering conservation of culturally and historically important heritage sites such as the Kano City walls, open and green spaces including campaign against removing of old trees on Abuja-Kano Dual Carriage Way Rehabilitation project sites of Julius Berger Nigeria Plc for which the construction giant obliges positively. 2013—Research Fellow, Earth System Governance Project (Future Earth). This is the world's largest social science research network in the area of governance and global environmental change. Aliyu led development of some Apps available on Play Store namely BUKTrees.

Public engagement Aliyu Salisu Barau engages with the public through regular writing on multiple environmental issues in Nigeria and beyond especially in English and Hausa languages. He has featured several enlightenment programs monitored by the BBC, DW, VOA, and local and regional radio and TV stations such as Freedom Radio, Arewa24 among others. He has co-produced short films for public environmental education and engagement science-policy-science community. Aliyu is also widely reported by the top Nigerian newspapers on environment, climate, energy, SDGs, biodiversity conservation and land degradation. Barau has a keen interest in using short films for public education and engagement for positive land climate action. He has co-produced three short films on drylands landscape restoration.

Selected publications

Barau, A.S.; Ludin, A.N.M (2012) Intersection of Landscape, Anthropocene and Fourth Paradigm. Living Reviews in Landscape Research, vol.6 no.1, 2012 (published by Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF), Germany. Kafi, K.M.; Barau, A.S.; Aliyu, A. (2021) The effects of windstorm in African medium-sized cities: An analysis of the degree of damage using KDE hotspots and EF-scale matrix. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction. doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2021.102070. (Elsevier).

Selected books

Barau, Aliyu Salisu(2004). "Environment and Sustainable Development in the Qur’an." International Institute of Islamic Thought(IIIT), Kano-Nigeria (2004).

Various reports

Chapter Scientist, (Chapter 4: Land Degradation) IPCC Special Report on climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems. Lead Author, Special Report on SDG 11 and Land Restoration Chapter. Commissioned by International Resource Panel of the UN Environment. 2015–2018 – Expert/Lead Author – Intergovernmental Platform for Science and Policy for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services – IPBES Africa Assessment Report. 2018 – 2019– Contributor/Co-Author, the UN Habitat Guiding Principles for Urban-Rural Linkages to Advance Integrated Territorial Development. This framework is designed to support countries implement 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (SDGs) and the New Urban Agenda (NUA) Executive Producer/Script writer – three Hausa short cartoons on public education on flood risk management (PASET/ICIPE Do-it-For Commons research project 2020–2023). Member of the Editorial Team, Climate change and cities: Third Assessment Report of the Urban Climate Change Research Network (ARC 3.3). Cambridge University Press. (This comprises twelve book elements published by the Cambridge University Press). Co-author of the Global Research and Action Agenda on Cities and Climate Change Science (GRAA). The Agenda aims to generate greater knowledge in support of practice and decision-making in urban areas, through collaborative research efforts. GRAA was supported by the IPCC, UN Habitat, WCRP, WMO, UNEP, ICLEI, C40, UCLG, Cities Alliance.

Awards

Recipient of the 2023 Africa Ecologist Award by the British Ecological Society. World Social Science Fellow (Sustainable Urbanisation) of the International Social Science Council, Research Fellow – Earth System Governance Project. World Social Science Fellow (Sustainable Urbanisation), appointed by the International Social Science Council (ISSC) of UNESCO as The ISSC is now renamed International Science Council. 2018 Top reviewer (top 1%) cross-field Clarivate/Web of Science. Honourable Mention Award for Unique Landscapes and Places – International photographic competition organised by Association of American Geographers, awarded at the 56th Annual General Meeting of the April 2011 Seattle, Washington State, United States. Honourable Mention Award in International Environmental Essay Contest Third Edition, 1998 organised by Francis Marion University, Florence, South Carolina, United States. Recipient of the 2011 Chinese Academy of Sciences Travel Grant for International Association for Landscape Ecology (IALE) Congress in Beijing.