Tyler Prize awarded to another member of the Gulbenkian Prize for Humanity jury
Argentinian ecologist Sandra Díaz and Brazilian-American anthropologist Eduardo Brondízio will receive the 2025 Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement for their extraordinary work linking biodiversity and humanity, as announced by the executive committee on the 11th February.
A member of the Gulbenkian Prize for Humanity jury since 2021, Sandra Díaz is a professor at the National University of Córdoba and CONICET, Argentina. She was a pioneer in the field of functional plant biodiversity and its links with societies, and is one of the world’s most cited scientists in ecology. She was also vice-president of the first intergovernmental global assessment of biodiversity and human quality of life (IPBES Global Assessment).
Díaz and Brondízio are awarded the prize of 250,000 dollars for their “commitment to understanding and addressing biodiversity loss and its impact on human societies”. In a joint statement, the winners said that “The climatic crisis, the biodiversity crisis, and the outrageous socioeconomic inequities in the world are all interrelated”, and, as such, “need to be tackled in an integrated manner” and “incorporated in policies, legislation, and initiatives from the public, civil society, and private sectors.”
In 2024, the same prize was awarded to scientist and member of the Gulbenkian Prize for Humanity jury, Johan Rockström, making this the the second year running that the prize has been awarded to a Gulbenkian Prize juror.
The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation has launched the annual Gulbenkian Prize for Humanity, worth 1 million euros, to honour individuals, organisations and groups whose outstanding contributions to climate action and climate solutions inspire hope. The independent jury, chaired by Angela Merkel, includes Díaz, Rockström and other experts in Earth system science, climate action, environmentalism and climate justice. The Prize has supported people and organisations facing the most serious impacts of climate change and enabled the winners to generate major breakthroughs in the area of climate action.