Annika Burke

WORK HISTORY

EDUCATION

ABOUT ANNIKA BURKE

Annika Burke is a senior climate and development economist with two decades of experience working at the intersection of climate change, capital, and international development.She currently heads the Climate Change and Nature practice at Adam Smith International (ASI), where she works with governments, development finance institutions, and private sector actors to design and deliver programmes that support climate transition, resilience, and sustainable economic growth. Her work spans climate finance, private sector development, value for money, and systems-level reform, with a strong focus on translating ambition into implementable strategies.Annika has worked extensively across the UK government and international development system, advising on and delivering large-scale aid programmes in complex environments. She has lived and worked in Uganda, Nepal, and Zambia, and has led or contributed to programmes across Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. This experience has given her a deep understanding of how climate, economic, and institutional challenges play out on the ground, and how power, incentives, and decision-making shape outcomes.Alongside her economics and policy work, Annika is a professionally trained executive coach. She works with women in leadership roles who are operating inside complex systems, supporting them to navigate authority, responsibility, and long-term decision-making under pressure. This strand of her work informs her approach to leadership and systems change, particularly in contexts of uncertainty and risk. In 2026, Annika is launching The Current, a conversation series exploring power, capital, and climate transition, and why awareness alone is not changing systems fast enough. She is also publishing her debut novel, Priestess, which explores burnout, leadership, and the challenge of staying engaged with the world’s problems without opting out.Annika believes that meaningful systems change happens when capable, conscious people stay in the room.She writes more reflectively about these themes on Substack: https://annikaburke.substack.com