Upcoming events
Celebrating Women in Conservation
CLIMATE, CASH AND CREEPY CRAWLIES – what the carbon economy will mean for you?
Join Trust for Nature for the first Bush Business Breakfast of the year as we celebrate and recognise 'women in conservation'.
Climate change is a major threat to the achievements of Trust for Nature, now celebrating its 40th year. On the eve of International Women’s Day, we bring together three environmental leaders to share their insights on the latest science, the carbon economy and the business opportunities flowing from it.
Wednesday 7th March, 2012 - 7am to 9am
RACV Club, 501 Bourke Street, Melbourne
$65 per ticket (inc. GST), $600 table of 10 (inc. GST)
Includes hot plated breakfast
Book online here through a secure booking website or call us on
(03) 8631 5888.
Our panel of prominent women includes:
1. Anna Skarbek – authority on carbon and emissions trading
2. Dr Joëlle Gergis – internationally recognised climate variability researcher
3. Monique Conheady – successful business-woman and "eco-preneur".
Hosted by environmental communicator Alexandra de Blas, the topic for this outstanding panel will be Climate, Cash and Creepy Crawlies – what the carbon economy will mean for you?
Our panel
Anna Skarbek
Anna Skarbek is Executive Director of ClimateWorks Australia, a new non-profit collaboration hosted by Monash Sustainability Institute in partnership with The Myer Foundation. Anna is currently a member of the Land Sector Carbon and Biodiversity Board, the Australian Government’s NGO Roundtable on Climate Change and a director of the Carbon Market Institute, Sustainable Melbourne Fund, Thermometer Foundation for Social Research on Climate Change and Linking Melbourne Authority.
Before joining ClimateWorks in September 2009 as its first full-time staff member, Anna worked in London’s carbon markets, as Vice President at Climate Change Capital – a specialist investment manager and advisor dedicated to raising and deploying capital for low carbon activities. Previously in Australia, Anna’s career included senior policy adviser for the Victorian Deputy Premier, investment banker in Macquarie Bank’s energy and utilities team, and solicitor with the national corporate law firm Mallesons Stephen Jaques.
Anna was also director of the Big Issue Australia for three years and served on the board of Amnesty International Australia from 2000-2006 in roles including National Treasurer and Victorian President.
Dr Joëlle Gergis
Joelle is a palaeoclimatologist and science communicator working with Professor David Karoly at the University of Melbourne. Her research focuses on reconstructing climate variability over the past 200–2,000 years using annually-resolved tree rings, corals, ice cores and historical records. She is leading a large multi-disciplinary Australian Research Council (ARC) Linkage project to reconstruct south-eastern Australia’s climate history over the past 200–500 years.
As leader of the international Past Global Changes (PAGES) working group on Australasian climate variability of the past 2,000 years (Aus2K), she developed the region’s 1000 year temperature reconstruction for input into the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report.
Joelle received her PhD in high-resolution palaeoclimatology from the University of New South Wales in 2006, and is currently a part-time student in RMIT’s Professional Writing and Editing program.
Monique Conheady
Monique is the co-founder and company CEO of Flexicar – a cheap, green and easy alternative to car ownership. Flexicar is a leading Australian car sharing service, with cars parked around inner suburban locations. Monique is passionate about new ways of doing business that are financially, socially and environmentally sustainable, and she aspires to be a serial "eco-preneur". Monique grew up in the Mallee (northern Victoria), where her family still lives.
Graduating with honours from the University of Melbourne in both Engineering and Arts, Monique previously worked as an engineer/project manager in the infrastructure sector. Her experience includes time in both the private & public sectors on projects as diverse as a renewable energy program for remote Indigenous communities, an urban regeneration project for an old mining town in the north of England and a new head office building for Sainbury's in Cario.
In 1998 she was awarded the National Association of Women in Construction Young Achiever Award. She is a Committee Member of the Moreland Energy Foundation Limited, a Fellow of the Centre for Sustainability Leadership and an Associate of Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute. In 2009 Monique was selected as for a Churchill Fellowship. She was also awarded the 2009 Victorian Winner of the Hudson Private & Corporate Sector Award in the Telstra Business Women's Awards. For fun she does an occasional co-host with Derek Guille on 774 ABC Radio.
