Professor Anne Poelina, PhD, PhD, MEd, MPH&TM, MA, is a Nyikina Warawa Indigenous Australian — a poet, storyteller, filmmaker, and respected academic. She is Chair and Senior Research Fellow in Indigenous Knowledges at the Nulungu Institute, University of Notre Dame, and Adjunct Professor in Indigenous Education Futures, Arts & Society at Charles Darwin University.

With a lifelong commitment to justice, sustainability, and Indigenous knowledge systems, Professor Poelina has received widespread recognition for her leadership. In 2024, she was awarded the prestigious Geoethics Medal by the International Association for Promoting Geoethics (IAPG) for her global contributions to ethical and Indigenous approaches to environmental stewardship. The same year, she received the Bessie Rischbieth Conservation Award from the Conservation Council of Western Australia for her outstanding commitment to protecting the environment and for her courage in advocating for free, prior and informed consent and the precautionary principle in both government and non-government decision-making.

Professor Poelina is a member of the Commonwealth Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water Indigenous Advisory Committee (2024), a member of the Institute for Water Futures, and a Visiting Fellow at the Water Justice Hub at The Australian National University.

She is the Inaugural Chair of the Martuwarra Fitzroy River Council (2018), a founding member of the Western Australian Government Aboriginal Water and Environment Group (AWEG) (2019), and was the inaugural First Nations appointee to the Murray–Darling Basin Independent Advisory Committee on Social, Economic and Environmental Sciences (2022).

Her contributions have been recognised with numerous awards, including the Women Taking Climate Action Award (2023), presented by the Zonta Club of Melbourne on Yarra and Zonta International District 23, and the Kailisa Budevi Earth and Environment Award (2022), awarded on International Women’s Day in recognition of her global influence in environmental leadership. In 2017, she was named a Laureate by the Women’s World Summit Foundation (Geneva), and she is also a Peter Cullen Fellow for Water Leadership (2011).

Professor Ariella Helfgott is a strategic foresight practitioner with more than 20 years of experience enabling future-focused dialogues, collaboration, and systemic change across 26 countries. Her work centers on co-creating sustainable, equitable, healthy, and prosperous futures—locally, nationally, and globally.

Ariella is the Director of Foresight and Strategic Learning the World Energy Council in its global secretariat, advancing vital conversations and actions to transform our energy societies and economies in the face of climate change. She also serves as a Professor at the University of Adelaide and Program Director of Foresight and Decision-Making for the One Basin CRC, supporting efforts to enhance productivity, resilience, and sustainability in Australia’s Murray–Darling Basin and is a member of the Futures Council of the ANU National Security College, contributing to national and international strategic insight. She has previously served as Director of Strategic Foresight in the Department of the Premier and Cabinet for the Government of South Australia, Director of Scenarios for the World Energy Council, a member of the Shell Scenario Team, Director of Collaborative Futures, and lead academic research programs for many year at the Universities of Oxford, Utrecht, Wageningen and Adelaide.

Her commitment is to champion open, future-facing conversations and projects that nurture caring, peaceful, inclusive, and prosperous societies—both today and for generations to come.

Dr Lorraine Finlay is the Human Rights Commissioner at the Australian Human Rights Commission. In this role Lorraine leads the work of the Commission in areas including modern slavery, emergency responses, asylum seekers and refugees, business & human rights, and technology & human rights.

Prior to joining the Commission, Lorraine has worked as a lawyer and academic specializing in human rights and public law. She holds a PhD in Law from the University of Queensland and a dual Masters in Law from New York University and the National University of Singapore, where she studied as a Singapura Scholar. Her past roles have included working as the Senior Human Trafficking Specialist with the Australian Mission to ASEAN, an academic at Murdoch University, and a State Prosecutor with the WA DPP.