Alemu Lemma is a humanitarian leader whose educational background includes a BSc in Psychiatry and an MSc in Clinical and Community Mental Health; he is currently pursuing an MA in Project Management. He is also a certified civic leader from President Obama’s Young African Leadership Institute. He has more than eight years of work experience with hands-on practice in different settings, including university teaching, research, community development projects, clinical mentorship, internally displaced persons (IDP), and refugee operations.

Alemu joined CVT in July 2022 as a project coordinator, and as of December 2022, he is serving as an area manager at CVT Ethiopia. He has served in different positions, including as a lecturer, researcher, Mental Health Gap Action Programme (mhGAP) and psychological first aid (PFA) training coordinator at the University of Gondar, Ethiopia; country committee chairman at the YALI Ethiopian Chapter; emergency mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) and gender-based violence (GBV) team leader at APHI; and senior MHPSS officer at the International Medical Corps (IMC), respectively. Alemu has very good working experience on programs focusing on MHPSS, GBV, community-based disability-inclusive development, childcare and humanitarian response. He trained more than 300 primary health care workers on mhGAP-Humanitarian Intervention Guide and other psychosocial supports.

Alemu has also published a number of research papers focusing on mental health and gender-based violence in reputable international journals alone and with his colleagues. Alemu’s research work can be found at this link. Alemu is skilled in team, project and budget management, representation, partnership development and networking.