Sydney Environment Institute
Newsletter
July 2025
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Dear SEI Community,
This instalment of the SEI newsletter will be reaching your inboxes partway through the 50th NAIDOC week. The 2025 theme, The Next Generation: Strength, Vision & Legacy, celebrates not only the achievements of the past but the bright future ahead. Visit the NAIDOC week calendar for a huge array of powerful events. Related, we are excited to announce a new project to commence in 2026. ‘Including the more-than-human in decision making’ has been funded by the V. Kann Rasmussen Foundation. Led by SEI Deputy Director, Professor Danielle Celermajer and myself, this project will develop practical tools to enable policymakers, scholars, practitioners, and communities to co-design more-than-human-representation processes – starting with climate assemblies and adaptation planning.
Finally, I am very proud to share with you SEI’s latest magazine, Partnering for good: 2020-2024. This publication features impact stories of our research and coincides with a five-year review process which research institutes at the University of Sydney are required to undertake. Over the past five years, the Sydney Environment Institute has experienced remarkable growth, not only in the scale of our research but in our impact across policy, community engagement, and interdisciplinary collaboration. From a membership of 72 in 2020, to an incredible 600 by the end of 2024, SEI has evolved into a dynamic, world-leading research institute, shaping critical conversations on environmental justice, climate adaptation, biodiversity loss, and multispecies futures.
Preparing for our review has been a heartening process, not just in re-examining the growth of SEI and the many achievements of our members and collaborative projects, but also in planning for the next five years. We spoke with many of you through this process and heard inspiring and expansive ideas for how SEI might develop and respond to the current and coming contexts and challenges. We look forward to sharing our 2026-2030 strategy with you later this year.
The next SEI newsletter will reach your inboxes in September. Until then, stay safe.
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What ‘nature positive’ means in practice
The term ‘nature positive’ has gained significant traction, now often mentioned alongside ‘net zero’ by governments and corporations. But what does it mean in practice, and who stands to benefit from it? This panel will explore the concept of ‘nature positive’, examining its role in conservation, policy, and finance. We’ll delve into the vested interests behind the term, questioning whether it really benefits ecosystems and marginalised communities or if it’s just another corporate buzzword.
- Date: Thursday 21 August 2025
- Time: 5.30 - 7.00pm
- Location: Greenhouse Climate Tech Hub, Salesforce Tower
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 | Partnering for good: 2020-2024
Over the past five years, the Sydney Environment Institute has experienced remarkable growth, not only in the scale of our research but in our impact across policy, community engagement, and interdisciplinary collaboration. The latest SEI magazine features impact stories of our research.
| |  | Reimagining democracy podcast
In this instalment of the SEI Podcast Series, hear from leading environmental figures as they explore models of more-than-human governance, drawing from Indigenous knowledges, creative an d legal practices, and innovative research. This event is part of SEI’s Climate Justice Series. | |
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 | Arunima Malik wins Frontiers Planet Prize
The Frontiers Planet Prize has announced SEI member Associate Professor Arunima Malik as one of three 2025 International Champions, awarding her US$1 million to advance her and her research team’s work in sustainability science. It is the largest individual monetary prize for research in the University’s history.
| |  | Women's leadership critical to Northern Rivers flood recovery
New research from SEI members, Dr Rebecca McNaught, Dr Jo Longman and Emma Pittaway at the University Centre for Rural Health in Lismore documents the vital yet often invisible role women played in leading community recovery after the 2022 Northern Rivers floods.
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In case you missed it
- Applications are now open for the Westpac Research Fellowship which supports early career researchers who are looking to fast-track their trajectory and create positive change in Australia.
- SEI member, Dr Charlotte Feakins, was awarded an ARC Linkage Grant for Re-storying Kakadu National Park by integrating archaeological, ethnographic and cultural landscape approaches to tell inclusive stories of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal lives, enriching national heritage narratives.
- A Curious Trail of Animal Tales, an interactive storytelling project which brings together an assortment of animal stories, can be explored online or at the Chau Chak Wing Museum.
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