Vivian Atakos leads Global Engagement and Policy at the CGIAR GENDER Impact Platform where she commendably steers conversations that enable maximum impact on gender equality, opportunities for youth and social inclusion in agriculture and food systems. She has over ten years of progressive professional experience facilitating exchanges that bring evidence to policy makers, innovation to partners, and new tools to harness the economic, environmental, and nutritional power of agriculture in a changing climate. She is experienced in engaging across established policy processes such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (among others) bringing the evidence on food system transformation before decision makers and other players as well as driving innovative advocacy and outreach campaigns on gender, food systems transformation, climate change and nutrition.
She holds a Master of Arts in Development Communication from Daystar University and a Bachelor of Science in Information Sciences, both in Kenya. Furthermore, she holds a diploma in Modern Diplomacy from the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna (Diplomatische Akademie Wien) and the United Nations University Institute on Comparative Regional Integration Studies (UNU-CRIS) summer school of 2021. In October 2023, Vivian received an Executive Diploma in Diplomacy from the European Academy of Diplomacy in Warsaw, Poland with a specialisation in International Organisations.