Shane Orchard

Dr Shane Orchard is a spatial ecologist and conservation scientist based in Aotearoa New Zealand. He works as an independent consultant in water resource management specialising in the biogeography and socioecology of environmental extremes and natural disasters.

As an Adjunct Research Fellow and senior researcher at UC he contributes to government-funded research programmes. 

In the non-profit and community sector he is a strong advocate and long-time supporter of community science. He is the current Oceania Regional Chair for the IUCN Commission on Ecosystem Management and a member of the World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA) and several associated specialist groups and international collaborations.

Shane's work is centred on the resilience and regeneration of coastal, river and floodplain ecosystems with a focus on recovery from natural disasters.

His main research interests are the impacts of hydrological hazards such as flooding, erosion and sea level rise and their interactions with a changing climate.