Holger Kuhle

Holger Kuhle works as a policy advisor for strategic knowledge partnerships at the GIZ Division “Economic and Social Development, Employment” and manages a component of Circular Economy within a global program on technology transfer for the protection of the environment. He leads the cooperation between GIZ and the Global Solutions Initiative in these functions. The focus here is on solution-oriented exchanges between think tanks, especially from the T20, and policy implementation practitioners from GIZ and its partner countries. Previously, Holger has been engaged, especially in the 2030 Agenda, regarding various technical topics, especially on urban development, as GIZ advisor at the UN-Sustainable Solutions Network. Before that, he worked on local economic development in Aleppo/Syria within GIZ’s Urban Development Program in Syria. Later, he led a component of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship program in Tunisia. After reaching his PhD in urban development at Humboldt University Berlin, he started his professional career with a focus on economic, employment, and infrastructure development at the Regional Development Bank of the Land Berlin (IBB) with application-oriented research on new approaches to support and financing instruments while managing their implementation.

Why did you join the Solutions Lab? “For me, development cooperation contributes first and foremost to progress that enables future generations to live a dignified life on earth. Investments dedicated to this progress are key. I am interested in the question of how investments can be organized, regulated, and used in such a way that they help to avert the current socio-economic man-made inequality, the loss of biodiversity, and climate change. What needs to happen to achieve this? What approaches exist for this, and how can they be scaled up?”