Academic and diplomat Simone Borg will chair a steering group tasked with drafting a post-COVID strategy for Malta, the government announced on Saturday. 

Borg, who heads the Department of Environmental Law at the University of Malta’s Faculty of Laws, will lead seven other steering group members and coordinate development of the post-COVID strategy. 

Her appointment was announced by minister Owen Bonnici, whose portfolio includes coordination of post-COVID-19 strategy. 

The steering group has been given until the end of June to develop the strategy, which it will draft after assessing work under way in various ministers to see how it could affect post-pandemic recovery and looking at what other countries are doing as they prepare for life after COVID-19. 

Borg is a specialist in the conservation of marine natural resources and has worked in foreign and environmental affairs under various administrations. 

Apart from her work at the University of Malta, she is also the director of the internal Master of Arts Programme in Ocean Governance and a Fellow of the Sustainability Institute in Bruges. 

She has served as Malta's ambassador for climate change. 

Borg will be joined on the steering group by the following members: Joyce Dimech, Mario Galea, Godwin Mifsud, James Pearsall, Gordon Sammut, Clive Tonna and Paul Zahra. 

The steering group will be given the power to appoint technical experts to provide specialised help, the government said. 

Minister Owen Bonnici thanked the steering group members for accepting the responsibility. 

"It is crucially important to co-ordinate and implement an ambitious and robust post pandemic strategy that enables us to keep moving forward in a changed world," he said.