Tianbao Qin is a Luojia Professor of Law, and serves as director of the Wuhan University Office of International Affairs and of the Research Institute of Environmental Law (RIEL). He is also associate dean for research and international affiliations at the School of Law, deputy director of the Research Center of the Supreme Court of China on Environmental-related Judicial Theory, and a professor of the China Institute of Boundary and Ocean Studies and the European Studies Centre at Wuhan University. In addition, he is editor in chief of the Chinese Journal of Environmental Law and a member of the compliance committee of the Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit Sharing.

Dr. Qin received his Batchelor of Laws and Master of Laws degrees from Wuhan University, finished his doktorarbeit (doctoral dissertation) at Johann Wolfgang Goethe Universität Frankfurt in Germany and obtained his Doctor of Laws from Wuhan University. He was also a post-doctor research fellow at Ghent University in Belgium.

He is a legal advisor for the Ministry of Water Resources, Wuhan Municipal Government and Xiangyang Municipal Government, a legislative expert for China’s Ministry of Environmental Protection, Ministry of Agriculture, and Hubei Provincial Parliament, and headed or participated in the drafting of several major environmental bills. He is also an advisor for Chinese negotiations on biodiversity, ocean and climate change issues, and was a legislative expert for the UNEP Division of Environmental Law and Conventions, and an environmental law expert for several projects of international institutions (GEF, UNDP, ADB) in China. He was head of the Environmental Rights Department at the Centre for the Protection of Rights for Disadvantaged Citizens (CPRDC) which is a prestigious human rights NGO in China.

He is a part-time professor at China Minzu University and South-West University of Political Science and Law; a legal research fellow at the Center for International Sustainable Development Law (CISDL); co-editor of the IUCN Academy of Environmental Law Journal; a member of the advisory board for the Law, Environment and Development Journal (LEAD); and lead author and review expert of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES).

Qin is vice president and secretary general of the Chinese Society of Environment and Resources Law (CSERL); vice chairman of the Division of Environmental Damage Assessment of the Chinese Society for Environmental Sciences; a member of the board of directors of the Chinese Association of European Law and the Chinese Association of WTO Law; a member of the IUCN World Commission on Environmental Law and the Commission on Ecosystem Management; a member of governing board of the IUCN Academy of Environmental Law; and a member of the committee on legal principles relating to climate change of the International Law Association.

He was a visiting professor at Macau University of Science and Technology from January to March of 2018; a distinguished international environmental law scholar at Vermont Law School in July, 2017; an EU Marie Curie Fellow at the University of Turin from December 2014 to February 2015; a senior research fellow at the University of Göttingen from June 2012 to June 2014; and a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars from June to July 2011. He was also a visiting professor at Ghent University in Belgium from April to September 2011; at the Institutum Iurisprudentiae from July to August 2006; at Academia Sinica in Chinese Taipei from December 2008 to May 2009; and at the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom from June to September 2007; as well as a DAAD Scholarship holder at Johann Wolfgang Goethe Universität Frankfurt in Germany from June 2003 to June 2005.

Currently, he is concentrating on research into law and policy concerning biodiversity and biotechnology, water and oceans, climate change and energy, environment and health, and trans-boundary environmental issues. Qin is author of several books and more than 100 articles in these fields. His recent publications include: “Research Handbook on Chinese Environmental Law” (Edward Elgar, eds), “Principles of International Biodiversity Law” (CUPL Press), “Legal Issues on Access to Genetic Resources and Benefit-sharing” (WHU Press), and “Arctic Law and Governance: The Role of China and Finland” (Hart Publishing, with Timo Koivurova, eds).