Melanie Hutchinson

Melanie Hutchinson is the Earth Observations Partnerships lead for the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), maintaining and building earth observations partnerships domestically and internationally to ensure that Defra has the necessary networks to understand the best available evidence to support its policy teams in developing and monitoring policy.  GEO is a main part of this portfolio and Melanie works with both the UK Space Agency and the UK’s National Centre for Earth Observations in coordinating the UK engagement with both GEO and CEOS.  She has also welcomed the opportunity to contribute to the future direction of GEO through the Post-2025 Working Group.  Prior to joining Defra, Melanie worked internationally in both the private sector and with the UN, with a focus on mainstreaming environment into the 2030 Agenda and Sustainable Development Goals.  Her passion is for finding synergies and building innovative solutions that draw together the experience and expertise of multiple stakeholders, which is why working with GEO is a privilege.