Mohamed is the Project Coordinator for the Somalia Urban Resilience Project funded by the World Bank. Mohamed has extensive experience in municipal project management with a focus on city resilience, urban displacement, durable solutions and sustainable infrastructure.
Before joining the project, Mohamed Taruri worked in the office of the Mayor as a policy advisor and he played a key role in driving forward partnership agreements between the municipality and the development partners including the World Bank Somalia and UNHABITAT.
Mohamed has worked with the World Food Program Somalia, working closely with the beneficiaries, NGO partners and local authorities in extremely critical duty stations in Somalia. In 2011, during the Horn of Africa drought crisis, Mohamed demonstrated excellent programme coordination skills in providing technical support to WFP senior management and implementing partners in Somalia.
During his work with World Vision Somalia, Mohamed participated in grassroots peacebuilding projects, child rights advocacy, community-based disaster management planning, and GBV and FGM awareness raising campaigns in Somalia. One of his my most innovative projects was the practical implementation of child friendly spaces in Bay/Bakol regions in Somalia.
In 2005, Mohamed was one of the young people who participated in the United Nations Secretary General's study on Violence against Children in South Africa. Mohamed met Professor Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, the independent expert for the UN Secretary-General´s study on violence against children. The study experiences have enabled him to become a better rounded young leader. After returning home, he was engaged in the creation of child friendly spaces in Bay & Bakol regions with the help of WVI and UNICEF Somalia. Mohamed is a certified Peer Support helper and has voluntarily worked with emotionally distressed children and youth who lack supportive environments, and displaced women facing humanitarian emergencies in the field.
He holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Leicester in the UK and a master’s degree in Public Policy & Administration from Kenyatta University, in Nairobi. Mohamed has a strong interest in social exclusion, urban politics, local government and community development.
I have seen communities suffering continuous social exclusion where the only hope they are waiting for is support by non-governmental organizations rather than the government; in Somalia, the impact of social exclusion remains hidden particularly in the rural areas and remote regions where poor people continue to face structural inequality and there is a need to do so much to prevent social exclusion and structural inequality in this world.Mohamed Ali Taruri