Sandeep Prasad, Executive Director, Action Canada for Population and Development, Canada

Since January 2011 he has served as the Executive Director of Action Canada for Population and Development (ACPD), a human rights organization working within Canada and internationally on issues of reproductive and sexual rights and health.

His resolve to commit his career to these issues solidified 16 years ago, when he began his post-secondary education and immediately became a student activist working to promote awareness on campus of issues faced by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students.

Sandeep earned his law degree at the University of Ottawa in 2004.

Between 2006 and 2011, Sandeep served as ACPD’s director of International Human Rights Advocacy, where he was responsible principally for ACPD’s advocacy activities within the UN human rights system. In this role, Sandeep established himself as a leader in efforts to advance sexual and reproductive rights within the work of key UN bodies and mechanisms. His advocacy was instrumental in prompting the UN Human Rights Council to include maternal mortality and morbidity as a human rights issue in a landmark 2009 resolution.

Mr. Prasad’s work to ensure that sexual and reproductive rights issues receive greater attention from the Human Rights Council and its mechanisms – including the universal periodic review (UPR) – has included his active participation in the Sexual Rights Initiative, a small South-North coalition of organizations that Sandeep helps to coordinate.

Sandeep currently serves as vice-president of Canadians for Choice, a national charity that provides information, education and research to help ensure that all individuals have access to the information, resources and services needed to make and exercise informed choices in all aspects of their sexual and reproductive health.