Aida Salili

Aida is a Risk Finance Capacity Development Expert at the Centre, leading the design and delivery of training programmes and capacity development initiatives that help governments strengthen their approach to disaster risk financing. Prior to this, she worked in the Advisory function as a Risk Analyst, collaborating with partner organisations and governments to inform sovereign-level diagnostics through data collection and analysis.

Her capacity development work spans Africa and the Pacific, where she has engaged with governments and development partners to build lasting expertise in disaster risk financing across some of the world's most climate-vulnerable regions.

Before joining the Centre's mission on disaster preparedness, Aida worked in disaster response — supporting Middle Eastern refugees in the humanitarian sector, bringing a gender lens to her advocacy for women's rights as she later went to work with survivors of domestic abuse navigating the UK system. This grounding in frontline humanitarian work continues to shape how she approaches development, with empathy, context, and a commitment to those most exposed to risk.

Outside of work, Aida holds a degree in Astrophysics from Queen Mary University of London, with her research focusing on small-scale anomalies in the Lambda-Cold Dark Matter model. She is also passionate about heritage conservation — particularly the preservation of cultural sites and artefacts threatened by climate change and conflict — and volunteers as a conservationist at a museum where she dedicates her time to preserve the material heritage of West Asia.