"Rotary and its Environment"

Dr. Christopher (Chris) Puttock is a botanist with four decades of experience in environmental conservation and habitat restoration.

• He is particularly concerned with the maintenance of ecosystems to function naturally and sustainably, and in preventing their demise by human exploitation reaching past their tipping points.
• Chris has been a Research Associate at the Smithsonian Institute, National Museum of Natural History (2008-2021) and prior to that Collections Manager of Botany at Bishop Museum (1998-2005) and Coordinator of the Hawaii Conservation Alliance (2005-2008).
• He is a past President of the Maryland Native Plant Society (2021-2022) and until moving to Hawaii was Executive Director of Chesapeake Natives, Inc. (2009-2022), the only local ecotype nursery producing hundreds of species of plants to sustain the native flora and fauna of the Chesapeake Bay Watershed.
• In June 2022, following RICON in Houston, Chris moved back to Hawai‘i continuing working largely in biodiversity projects worldwide with Rotary International, as he is recognised as an environmental leader for the 7^th Area of Focus – The Environment.
• He is the Chair (2023-2025) of the Rotary Action Group’s Council Cabinet.
• He was one of five with RI President Jennifer Jones as the Rotary International Representatives at COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt (November 5-20, 2022) and is now heading up planning for COP28 in Dubai, UAE (November 30-December 12, 2023).
• Tapped by Past RI President Shekhar Mehta in December 2021, Chris is the worldwide lead for mangrove restoration for sustainable living global grant projects and has been featured several times in the Rotary Magazine in the past three years, regarding mangroves and pollinators.
• He is a founding Director of the Environmental Sustainability Rotary Action Group (ESRAG 2015), Executive Director (2015-2018), Chair (2019-2021), Senior Advisor (2021-present).
• He is a member of The Rotary Foundation (TRF) Cadre of Technical Advisors for Water and the Environment (2022-2025).
• Chris is a regular speaker at RI Presidential Conferences, Zone Institutes and District Conferences.
• He can speak on almost anything to do with the environment: biodiversity, restoration, ecosystem services, global warming, and environmental sustainability, mitigation, adaptation, and resilience.