Jean Miczka was elected to the UIAA’s Management Board in 2020 where he represents the Fédération Française des clubs alpins de Montagne (FFCAM) for whom he is Vice President. He was re-elected to the MB in 2024 as Continental Representative for Europe.

Jean has a keen interest in youth participation, environmental protection and sustainability. In 2020, he participated in the The Cross Border Mountain Trip, a multi-dimensional project which focused on human issues affecting local people and cultures, academic research highlighting borders’ issues, as well as a skiing, mountaineering and trekking trip from France to Pakistan.

Jean has Master’s Degrees in both Political Science and International Relations and International European Law. He is currently studying for a PhD at Lausanne University.

Paul Carstensen is the President of the Mountain Club of South Africa (MCSA) and sits on the UIAA Management Committee as the Continental Representative for Africa.

He is a long-serving member of the MCSA having joined the Johannesburg section of the Mountain Club through the Scouting Association in 1992, and the Cape Town Section in 1998.

Paul has supported the Johannesburg section for many years as a Committee member in the portfolios of Legal, Land and Access and Meets.

He has significant climbing experience having led a team of 1st Edenvale Scouts to summit Kilimanjaro, and along with Peter Lazarus, led a MCSA expedition to summit Mount Kenya.

In his professional career, Paul is a senior advocate at the Johannesburg Bar and a qualified mediator and arbitrator.

Phil Powers, a long-serving and highly respected member of the climbing community, was elected on to the UIAA Management Board in 2020 where he serves as the Continental Representative for North America. Phil was re-elected to the MB in 2024.

Phil has amassed significant experience, not only throughout his time immersed in the climbing and mountaineering world, but also through over 20 years working in senior leadership and management roles throughout his professional life.

He served as CEO of the American Alpine Club for 15 years (2005-2020). During his tenure, the AAC saw a significant growth in membership, promoted greater diversity and inclusion, and oversaw the development and implementation of projects such as Campaign for Climbers, which raised over $5 million in order to build campgrounds, buy hostels and hire regional staff across the country.

During this period, the AAC hosted the 2019 UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup in downtown Denver, an event which witnessed record crowds of over 25,000 people for the two-day competition.

Phil began climbing as a teenager, and has since gone on to lead dozens of expeditions to South America, Alaska and The Karakoram Range in Pakistan. He made the first ascent of both the Washburn Face on Denali, as well as that of the Lukpilla Brakk’s Western Edge in Pakistan. In 2011, he sustained serious injuries when falling some 70ft while climbing at High Wire Crag in Clear Creek Canyon, a popular spot close to the AAC’s headquarters in Golden.

Phil is an experienced climbing instructor having taught NOLS courses around the world. He acted as Chief Mountaineering Instructor for five years at the National Outdoor Leadership School, where he also served as Development and Partnerships Director.

He remains owner of Mountain Guides, which owns and operates Jackson Hole Mountain Guides and Climbing School, a company who seek to deliver climbing education and guided trips with an emphasis on personal attention. Phil was also the President of the American Mountain Guides Association for 16 years.

In his professional life, Phil acted as Vice president at Naropa University, a liberal arts university inspired by Buddhist educational traditions. His responsibilities included all university fundraising, trustee cultivation and contributed to the completion of a ten-million-dollar campaign.

Phil is an active board member of Ascend, Leadership Through Athletics – a not-for-profit organisation – which seeks to use climbing as a tool to empower young women through athletic based leadership training in countries such as Afghanistan.

He is also a published author, having written Wilderness Mountaineering and Climbing, a comprehensive guide to climbing self-sufficiently.

Stuart Gray has been the Oceania Continental Representative on the UIAA Management Committee since 2013.

He is the former President of the New Zealand Alpine Club (NZAC) and has a keen focus on the issues of governance, strategy and communication.

In his personal time, Stuart is a keen climber and active mountaineer having trekked and climbed in South America, Tibet, Nepal, Central Asia and Europe. He is a geographer by training with a longstanding interest in human impacts on mountain and wild environments.

In his professional career, Stuart spent over 30 years involved in the dairy industry in New Zealand working as a business executive for Fonterra. He currently sits on the Board of a community art gallery in Auckland.

Willy Montenegro Garcia sits on the UIAA Management Committee as the representative for Central and South America.

He currently holds the position of President of the Federación De Andinismo De Chile (FEACH) and is a member of the Advisory Committee of the Pan-American Council of the International Federation of Sport Climbing (IFSC).

Willy has amassed over 40 years’ experience in mountaineering, completing a number of technical ascents throughout Chile and South America, including the 6282m Pomerape Volcano.

He has significant management experience having been President and Founder of Templar Mountaineering Club and President of the Santiago Association of Mountaineering and Hiking.

In his professional career, Willy has worked within the Information Technology industry for over 30 years.

Anthropologist, mountaineer, lecturer and journalist, Young Hoon Oh was elected onto the UIAA’s Management Committee in 2022 where he serves as the Continental Representative for Asia.

With a background in rock and ice climbing, Young Hoon Oh has a long-held passion for the mountains.

His interest in climbing began at university upon joining the Seoul National University Agricultural Alpine Club.

As a mountaineer, he has climbed walls and peaks across Asia and North America, including Mount Everest on four separate occasions, as well as peaks in Nepal and Pakistan.

With a young family and little time for climbing, Young Hoon has incorporated his passion for mountaineering into both his academic and professional life.

He has an MA & BA in Anthropology, completing his PhD in Anthropology at the University of California, Riverside. As part of his studies, Young Hoon spent 2 years living among the Sherpa communities in Nepal, studying the significant contribution they make to modern Himalayan mountaineering.

Young Hoon moved back to Korea in 2020, where he created, and became editor-in-chief of Alpinist Magazine Korea for a year. He also is the Korea Correspondent for the American Alpine Journal and writes for Mountain Monthly.

He is currently an Anthropological researcher specialising in mountaineering sports, sherpa guides and mountain protection. Young Hoon lectures in anthropology at Seoul University, South Korea, where he combines his passions for teaching, research and climbing advocacy.

Young Hoon has authored Climbing Sherpas in the Himalayas: An Anthropology of Sherpa Ethnicity, along with a number of academic articles on Sherpa mountaineering and the mountaineering history of Korea.

He is administrator for the Korea Alpine Federation and as Vice president of the Korea Mountaineering Institute.

Young Hoon resides in Daejeon, South Korea.