This publication is the product of the collaborative work among many staff members of  the Climate Change and Natural Resource Sustainability Cluster at the United Nations  Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA).

Special thanks go to the individuals listed below and to ESCWA cluster leaders, the  Publication Committee, staff from substantive clusters and external reviewers for their  comments and feedback.

The ESCWA project team consisted of Carol Chouchani Cherfane, Ziad Khayat (Report  Leader), Tracy Zaarour, Mohamed Abd Salam El Vilaly, Marlene Ann Tomaszkiewicz,  Dima Kharbotli, Sara Hess, Katharina Lehmann Uschner, Elie ElRahi and Martin Dersch.

Lead authors were Ziad Khayat and Tracy Zaarour.

The report benefited from background information and contributions by and/or technical  expertise from the ESCWA project team as well as Wael Mualla (International  University for Science and Technology and Damascus University), Norm Jones and  Sarva Pulla (Brigham Young University),  Our gratitude goes to members of ESCWA’s reviewers and Publication Committee who  provided comments and feedback: Mounir Tabet, Carol Chouchani Cherfane, Tarek  Sadek, Sara Salman, Soheil Rastan Rouba Arja and Mario Jales, as well as to external  reviewers: Waleed Zubari (Arabian Gulf University), Abdelkader Larabi (Université  Mohammed V) and Joanna Doummar (American University of Beirut).