24 September 2021

Scion’s newest Emeritus Scientist is Dr Tanira Kingi (Ngāti Whakaue, Ngāti Rangitihi).

While Tanira has retired from his fulltime research lead role at Scion he will continue to make a valuable and active contribution to the primary industry and Māori agribusiness sectors.

Tanira’s research and academic career spans almost 30 years in an area that he describes as the science of “integrating things that have not always sat comfortably next to each other”. He also describes himself as a ‘science pragmatist’ and prefers to reference some of his most memorable achievements as designing frameworks that farmers, growers, foresters, Māori land and iwi authorities, industry organisations, regional government and the Crown can lay new tracks going forward. He has been a regular appointment to government advisory groups working in the complex nexus of science, industry, iwi Māori and the Crown on designing and implementing climate change and freshwater policy.

Tanira is a graduate of the Australian National University (PhD in agricultural economics and development) and Massey University (MAppSc (Hons) in agricultural systems management). His current research focuses on developing multi-model spatial economic frameworks to explore viable alternative production systems, diverse land use, and value chain scenarios with reduced biological greenhouse gases and nutrients/contaminants to freshwater. A key component of his research is working with land owner collectives as the central platform to build momentum and scale for these changes to occur. His research is currently funded by the New Zealand Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Research Centre (NZAGRC) and Our Land & Water National Science Challenge (OLW NSC).

Tanira joined Scion in 2015 after senior roles at AgResearch and Massey University.