Zermina is a development professional with 4+ years of working experience in strategy development, programme design, and management, policy implementation, action research, gender mainstreaming, and climate change. Zermina has been involved in primary-level research, evidence-based policymaking, advocacy, capacity building, and programme implementation while working with a range of stakeholders including national governments, businesses, donor agencies, and local communities. Developed and designed several policy documents, research reports, briefs, and papers for organizations such as WWF, TDEA/FAFEN, and ILO among others. At present, Zermina is leading the sustainable infrastructure work and co-leading the governance work at WWF – Pakistan. On the academic front, Zermina has a master’s degree in Anthropology from Quaid-i-Azam University, Pakistan for which she was awarded the Vice Chancellor’s Medal.
Co-leading WWF International’s governance work as a network office.
Implementing advocacy, communication, and outreach strategies including developing and hosting a series of Knowledge and Experience Sharing sessions across the WWF Network, leading the development of a dedicated governance webpage, and assisting in drafting and reviewing the Network’s position paper on Sustainable Infrastructure.
Led proposal development for nine proposals from January 2024 till present including a $34,000 proposal for Nagao Wetland Fund (NWF), a £203,000 proposal for the Defra Biodiversity Challenge Fund (the Darwin Initiative), a $135,000 proposal for KNCF, and a $150,000 proposal for EREF .
Continue implementing the Sustainable Infrastructure initiative and co-developing a new Big Cats and Infrastructure working group including ideation, strategy, concept, coordination, budget, and activity management.
Assisted the Programme Development team with organizing WWF – Pakistan’s 50 years celebration event.
Led WWF Pakistan’s Sustainable Infrastructure initiative through the implementation of two projects.
Led the research, analysis, and data collection for both projects including an exhaustive review of legislation, policy and global frameworks and practices for legislative amendments to Federal and Gilgit Baltistan Environmental Protection Acts.
Led the coordination for both projects (currently extended till September 2023) including liaison with national and international organizations, academia, WWF network offices, government agencies & institutes, and community stakeholders.
Led the finalization and arrangements for workshops and capacity-building sessions.
Led the development of communication products including drafting, reviewing & editing reports, policy briefs, and concept notes.
Led the coordination with WWF International and Sustainable Infrastructure ACAI for the networks position paper on Sustainable Infrastructure.
Led and co-led the development of 5 proposals out of which 3 have been awarded, from June 2022 to January 2023, including a ¥70,000 proposal for Shan Shui Nature Conservation Centre (‘With Snow Leopards Small Grants), a $4,523,000 proposal for the Global Environment Facility (GEF-8), a £17,000 proposal for British Council, and a $273,700 proposal for the Climate and Clean Air Coalition (CCAC).
Performed administrative tasks including scheduling and hosting meetings, developing contracts and ToRs/JDs, drafting and disseminating MoMs, agenda setting and runsheet for events, and managing travel plans and logistics.
Designed and assisted with a national-level vulnerability assessment report under an FCDO project to Strengthen Civic Spaces in Pakistan, including interviews, regional-level assessment, field visits, and data collection (Balochistan, Sindh and Punjab).
Developed case studies as a report based on the data and further designed advocacy and outreach material in the form of short narratives (Vulnerability Stories) for the same.
Developed periodic reporting, with 3 final reports, of Covid-19 assessments across Pakistan to understand the disease’s extent, nature, and spread (published on the TDEA website).
Designed and implemented the communication strategy under the guidance of the department head.
Developed outreach and communication strategies and products in the form of 75 success stories and testimonials, tweets, and 20 blog posts as well as content editing, reviewing, and copywriting.
Developed organization website content and a newsletter.
Conducted a Gender Review- Labour Legislation for the Province of Sindh.
Created a report based on Forced Labour for three countries of the Sub-Saharan Africa region.
Formulated a report to indicate whether Pakistan needed a stand-alone Forced Labour Act.
Formalized a matrix based on administrative data from the labour legislation based on SDGs.
Created an Employee Handbook for organizational use.
Assisted in a comparative legislative index for 115 countries.
Simplified Pakistan Labour Legislation for public usage.
Assisted in consultation interviews, report writing and conducted validation workshop for International Labour Organization's Convention C-183, Maternity Protection Convention.
Worked on formulating a situational analysis of Gig workers in Pakistan in collaboration with Oxford University under the Fairwork project.
Performed administrative tasks such as conducting interviews, creating documents, spreadsheets etc.
Assisted the Principal Investigator with publications by extracting and compiling data; reviewing and editing articles for publication.
Provided background research on Programmatic use of oral regimented medication for MDR-TB patients (shoRRT).
Assisted and partially developed both project based and organization based gender strategy for implementation.
Assisted and partially developed a competitive grant application by providing advice, information, review, data analysis and editing.
Assisted in the finalization of the project Work Plan and kept it updated in accordance with project activities and time-frames as relevant.
Assisted the team with Project Quality Assurance (PQAs).
Coordinated with project staff and assisted the team in updating project matrix.
Organized Launch of SEforALL National Action Plan; workshop on mountain protected areas.
Assisted in designing and printing of SEforALL National Action Plan.
Preparation of presentations, infographics; liaising with relevant stakeholders
Managed and Updated ATLAS database.
Interacted with customers professionally by phone, email or in-person to provide information and direct to desired staff members
Enhanced collaboration between team members by preparing meeting materials and taking clear notes to distribute to stakeholders
Tracked and recorded expenses to maintain accurate, current financial records
Kept physical files and digitized records organized for easy retrieval
Ensured that the office is well-maintained, organized, and secure
Recorded daily reports containing what was accomplished in the field on given days, as well as work to be completed
Researched and coordinated with international publishers for partnerships