Keynote speakers

Dr Mai Chen (LLB (Hons) (Otago), (LLM (Harvard), HonLLD (Otago), CMInstD), is a top barrister in NZ and President of NZ Asian Lawyers.

How to succeed when laws keep changing affecting waste: how do you best position yourself/entity and be effective?

In this keynote, Mai will explore how organisations can stay effective and strategically positioned amid constant legislative change in the waste and environmental sectors. She will unpack the fast‑moving landscape of law reform - from ongoing updates to the Natural Environment and Planning Bills to the evolving Fast-track Approvals Act and upcoming amendments to the Waste Minimisation and Litter Acts. Mai will discuss what can realistically be expected before Parliament rises prior to the election later this year, and what those timelines mean for planning and compliance. She will also explain how best to lobby for the policy and law changes you want – and do not want.

Beyond understanding what’s changing, Mai will focus on how to operate proactively: staying informed through key government updates, recognising critical reform milestones, and identifying where influence can still be applied before decisions are finalised. Attendees will gain insights into how to position their organisations effectively in the face of overlapping reforms across environmental regulation, planning frameworks, and local government – ensuring they’re not only prepared for new legislation but able to help shape it before it’s too late.

About Mai Chen's previous experience: 

• Managing Partner, Chen Palmer Public and Employment law Specialists
• Independent non-executive Director, Bank of New Zealand Board and chair of the People and Remuneration Committee
• Member of the New Zealand Securities Commission
• Adjunct Professor at the University of Auckland Business School and Law School
• Inaugural Chair of NZ Global Women
• Top 10 finalist, 2014 and 2016 New Zealander of the Year
• Top 50 Diversity Figures in Public Life, Global Diversity List supported by The Economist
• She has advised on the regulation and legislation concerning waste minimisation and the RMA for many years.

Chief Executive of Te Waihanga, the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission

National Infrastructure Plan

Geoff will discuss the National Infrastructure Plan that was published in December last year. The Plan sets out a practical, affordable pathway to deliver the infrastructure New Zealanders need to thrive over the next 30 years. It identifies 16 recommendations across four areas where New Zealand needs to lift performance and highlights 10 priorities for the decade ahead.

About Geoff

Geoff is the Chief Executive of Te Waihanga, the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission. Prior to this, he’s worked at the United States Federal Reserve and is a former Chief Economist at both PwC and Auckland Council. He holds a Master of Economics with First Class Honours from the University of Auckland and a Master of Public Affairs from Princeton University.

Financial and political commentator

NZ's political economy in a world of wars, climate change and elections 

Independent commentator Bernard Hickey will present on how New Zealand’s political economy is coping with existential challenges in the global economy, geopolitics and from climate change. With just months until the election, change and opportunity abound — for some.

About Bernard:

Bernard Hickey is a financial and political commentator who produces two daily podcasts and newsletters about Aotearoa's political economy and global finance. He has covered politics and economics for 35 years from Auckland, Wellington, Canberra, Sydney, London, Singapore and New York, as well as co-founded online news publishing businesses, including Newsroom, Interest.co.nz and The Kaka.

Tumu Whakarae - CEO, Te Rūnanga o Toa Rangatira, 

He waka e noa: We are all in this together!

When the Tainui waka arrived in Aotearoa 900 years ago, those aboard found an environment dramatically different to their tropical homeland. Their response was to change themselves, their habits, and practices to feed, clothe, and house themselves to live sustainably. 700 years later others arrived with a different philosophy that led them to cut, burn, dig, and build, changing what they found to fit themselves. We still live with the legacy of those opposing approaches to life in these beautiful islands.

Albert Einstein said, “we cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them”. Stephen Covey championed the transformative power of open minds and hearts to receiving insights that can change paradigms and enable radically improved outcomes.

Ngāti Toa Rangatira CEO Helmut Modlik contends that indigenous tikanga-based thinking and western technology-dominated approaches need not be in opposition but can complement each other for enhanced outcomes. He will offer insights enabling a paradigm shift in the way we think about the waste and resource recovery industry and how we can work together as “kaitiaki” or stewards to leave a legacy of outcomes that our grandchildren will bless us for.

About Helmut

Helmut is an experienced director, executive, and consultant with extensive experience across the private and public sector and with specialist skills in business and economic development, strategic planning, change management, and finance.  Helmut’s work over the last 20 years has focused on chief executive leadership of private sector company mergers, turnarounds, and business improvements.  Since 2020 Helmut has been CEO of Te Rūnanga o Toa Rangatira, with executive and governance responsibilities across a broad range of social and commercial enterprises.

Senior Lecturer in Applied Environmental Chemistry at Massey University’s School of Health Sciences

Environmental limits in transition: Science, policy, and community aspirations in New Zealand’s new resource management framework  

In this talk Nick will outline how New Zealand’s resource management reforms are changing the way environmental limits are set. He will explain why standards are never purely science-based, but instead combine scientific data with policy choices. The presentation introduces approaches for setting limits—from precautionary to risk-based—and how the new system will emphasize balanced judgment by councils to reflect community aspirations. Case studies on methamphetamine, arsenic, and fluorine will illustrate the practical challenges. Future environmental limits will be set following a central government methodology. The talk will conclude by advocating for a transparent, problem-led process that integrates science with community priorities to achieve environmental protection that is both effective and socially legitimate.

About Nick: 

Dr Nick Kim is a Senior Lecturer in Applied Environmental Chemistry at Massey University’s School of Health Sciences in Wellington, New Zealand, where he oversees environmental health programmes, teaches topics in toxicology, environmental monitoring and risk assessment, and supervises postgraduate research. Holding a first-class BSc(Hons) and PhD in Environmental Chemistry from the University of Canterbury, he has over three decades of experience bridging applied environmental chemistry, human health risk assessment and natural resource management. His career includes 11 years lecturing at the University of Waikato, a decade as Science Advisor at Waikato Regional Council (where he led contaminated site investigations, regional air/soil/water monitoring and made contributions to national standards such as the NES for Contaminants in Soil), and 13 years at Massey, together with a six-month secondment as Senior Policy Advisor at the Ministry for Primary Industries. Dr Kim has provided technical support for a wide range of government initiatives, acted as an independent hearings commissioner under the RMA, and contributed to reviews of methamphetamine testing practices, ecological soil guideline values, and chemical regulation in Aotearoa. In his keynote he will draw on this practical and policy experience to examine the transition in New Zealand’s environmental limits under the reformed resource management framework, highlighting the inevitable interplay of science, policy choices, community values and practical compromises.

Minister for the Environment, Minister for Vocational Education and Associate Minister for Social Development and Employment.

Hon Penny Simmonds was elected the MP for Invercargill in 2020.

Prior to her election to Parliament, Penny was Chief Executive of Southern Institute of Technology (SIT) and served as an advisory board member of Venture Southland. Penny was made a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to education, sport and the community in the 2016 New Years’ Honours list.