PhD student wins international environment competition

University PhD student Diogo Verissimo has seen his article on opportunities to increase sustainability in the financial crisis voted the best in the world in a web competition run by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and Thomson Reuters.

Diogo, of the University's Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology (DICE), submitted the article titled 'Greening the crisis: turning trouble into opportunity' to the 2012 IUCN -Thomson Reuters Media Award.

The IUCN invited people to submit articles focussing on environmental issues and these were uploaded to Facebook for voting. The article with the most votes won, with Diogo's article collecting over 5,300 votes.

Now Diogo is looking forward to enjoying his prize of all-expenses paid trip to the IUCN's 2012 World Conservation Congress, the world's leading summit on the environment, on Jeju Island, South Korea, in September.

Diogo said: 'I am thrilled to have received the vote of thousands of people and the support of many environmental organisations. I feel a true movement was formed in support of my article and the ideas behind it.

'My article is about the opportunities created by the financial crisis to reduce waste and therefore become more sustainable. Every day we waste huge amounts of essential resources such as food, water or electricity and this is a good time to make lifestyles more environmentally friendly.'

DICE is part of the University's School of Anthropology and Conservation.

Contact: pressoffice@kent.ac.uk

Story published at 10:48am 12 July 2012