Trained as an economist, Pulkit Bajpai has spent his career working with local governments around the world in pursuit of small initiatives that can add up to larger progress for climate change adaptation and funding.
Now, Bajpai hopes to combine this experience in climate economics and data science with new coursework as a student in Columbia Climate School’s M.S. in Climate Finance, where he is one of three recipients of the Stanley Park Scholarship. (The degree is a collaboration with the Columbia Business School.)
In the Q&A below, Bajpai tells us about his penchant for problem-solving, the importance of climate adaptation and what he hopes to learn from the program this year.
What was your reaction when you heard about your Stanley Park award?
I’m in many ways first-generation, and I was very thrilled when I got the offer for the program. I was excited to join but realistically, without the very generous scholarship, I wasn’t sure if it was even possible to attend. I felt that in terms of my specific goals, this program would unlock new avenues in climate work in India and the Global South. I felt both profoundly happy and that this was a very significant stepping stone for the work I want to do.
What brought you to the climate space and what has your journey been so far?
I’m trained as an economist. After university, I started working on economics and climate change, specifically climate adaptation in Sub-Saharan Africa and then also in Nepal and India. I think along with the fact that I’ve grown up in a significantly flood-prone area in India, I realized there is a big gap in terms of understanding and building resilient systems to focus on very vulnerable communities that are going to be affected by climate shocks and have been for a long time; and this is likely to be exacerbated in the future.
I continued doing research in the climate economic space in climate adaptation, largely by using tools from economics and data science and applying them to solving climate problems. Most recently, I’ve worked on simulating what a fair green taxation would and should look like in the U.K. My training in economics has allowed me to use the technical skills I’ve gained to try to solve distinct-climate related problems.
What made you decide to apply to the M.S. in Climate Finance and how do you think it will add to your existing experience?
My training is largely in economic research and data science. Those are great skills to have, and I have picked up climate science skills on the go, but I felt that a formal training in climate science would be beneficial with the sort of work I’m doing in India for the moment. I work with local government bodies to try to build their financial systems so they can scale up their adaptation measures at the very hyper-local level. Formal training in climate and finance would greatly add to my existing data science skills for the work I envision myself doing in the future, specifically in India and with local government partners.
Are there classes you’re looking forward to taking?
I’m a big believer in adaptation, so of course the Climate Change Adaptation class. There’s a lot of novelty around the business school coursework, given that I have little-to-no background in it, so I’m looking forward to the business school classes. Mostly, I’m quite excited to be in the rooms with a lot of climate adaptation discussion and coursework and also to take the International Climate Finance course from the Climate School.
How do you see yourself using these skills in the future?
My vision is to start small—where I come from, where I call home, working with local and then sub-local and state or provincial governments to create a standardized taxonomy of what adaptation should look like to deal with their needs. Then building and providing solutions to these government partners in restructuring their finances such that they can feed money into adaptation measures.
I think this summer, for example, I’ve had the chance to live in North India and live through the heat phase. So I’ve realized more acutely how much of a gap there is in terms of implementation and finances, especially in this part of the world or in the Global South generally. I want to build local solutions and provide technical expertise to unlock financial restrictions that a lot of local and regional government bodies face with public sector funding being misallocated.
Can you tell us more about your work this summer and what you’ve learned?
Conversations around climate change are not taking place as much as they should be in the places where people and lives are most affected. Therefore, a part of my journey this summer has been trying to do almost an informational session with government bodies, trying to make them aware the world of climate change in many ways. It sounds a bit paradoxical given that in India, we see a lot of news of floods, droughts and heat waves. Still, I feel that there is a huge gap in terms of those events being associated with this looming crisis that hangs as a specter over our heads.
Our goal has been to mobilize funds from climate bonds in a way that is revenue-generating to specifically tackle two areas: (1) building retrofitted and resilient structures in cities and urban spaces for heat waves and (2) creating better flood response systems.
What keeps you motivated to continue working on these challenging and important issues?
This may be the economist in me talking, but I feel I tend to look at the world as a problem-solving exercise and an optimization problem. Yet at the same time, growing up where I did, having worked where I’ve worked, I realized the human cost of problem-solving is that rewards are very high. And I think that keeps me motivated. In the world that we live in at the moment, and by all very harrowing projections of where we’re headed as a planet and the kind of impact it has on people in the part of the world I come from, I think that problem solving is my sole motivation and driver and why I want to continue building these solutions the best I can.