Seminar followed by Q&A and drinks – all welcome

Nature-based Solutions (NbS) are increasingly hailed as a means of tackling climate and biodiversity crises while benefiting society. Yet they’re often reduced to carbon-offset schemes or narrowly focused projects, overlooking their power for deeper systemic change. In this talk, I will explore how Western ecological science and Indigenous and Local Knowledge (ILK)—grounded in core values of relationality, reciprocity, responsibility, and redistribution—can unlock NbS’ transformative potential. Drawing on these worldviews, I will discuss how holistic measures, genuine community empowerment, and the reorientation of economic priorities toward stewardship can help NbS catalyse lasting social and ecological transformation rather than merely delivering incremental gains.

Nathalie Seddon is Professor of Biodiversity and Founding Director of the Nature-based Solutions Initiative in the Departments of Biology and Geography (Smith School for Enterprise and the Environment) at the University of Oxford. She is also Director of the Agile Initiative, member of the leadership team of the Leverhulme Centre for Nature Recovery, and is a Senior Research Fellow at Wadham College.

In 2021, she co-founded the Oxford University Social Venture, Nature-based Insights Ltd, of which she is non-executive Director.

Nathalie trained as an evolutionary ecologist at Cambridge University and has over 25 years of research experience in a range of ecosystems across the globe. As a University Research Fellow of the Royal Society, she developed broad research interests in understanding the origins and maintenance of biodiversity and its relationship with global change. Her work now focuses on the role of nature-based solutions in social and ecological flourishing, and how to increase the influence of robust biodiversity science as well as traditional knowledge on the design and implementation of climate and development policy.

The Leverhulme Centre for Nature Recovery and Biodiversity Network are interested in promoting a wide variety of views and opinions on nature recovery from researchers and practitioners. The views, opinions and positions expressed within this lecture are those of the author alone, they do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the Leverhulme Centre for Nature Recovery/Biodiversity Network, or its researchers.