Dame Anne Salmond (ONZ DBE CBE FNAS CFBA FRSNZ FAHNZ)
Distinguished Professor
Dame Anne is a distinguished Professor of Māori Studies and Anthropology at the University of Auckland. A former Vice-President (Social Sciences and Humanities) of the Royal Society of New Zealand and the first social scientist to be awarded the Rutherford Medal, New Zealand’s top scientific prize, in 2013 she was chosen as the Kiwibank New Zealander of the Year. In 2020 she was awarded the Blake Medal, and in 2021 the Order of New Zealand.
She has a lifelong engagement with te ao Māori, working alongside kuia and kaumātua and presenting evidence in the Muriwhenua Land and Fisheries Treaty claims, the Ngāpuhi claim for Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and the first test case of the Treaty clause of the Resource Management Act. Dame Anne also has a long-standing practical interest in environmental issues. In 1990 she became the Deputy Chair of the Parks and Wilderness Trust, and in 1999 she and her husband Jeremy established the Waikereru Ecosanctuary in Gisborne, a major ecological restoration project.
Since 2014 she has been a member of the Air New Zealand Sustainability Panel, and leads the Te Awaroa: Voice of the River project to restore rivers across New Zealand. She is the patron of many environmental and community organizations, and was a member of the Te Ao Māori reference group for the reform of the Resource Management Act. Anne Salmond writes about climate change, the restoration of rivers, forests and the ocean. In 2018 she was awarded a Carl von Siemens Research Prize by the Humboldt Foundation for lifetime scientific achievement, and in November 2019 she delivered a prestigious Kosmos lecture in Berlin on global environmental challenges.