Prof Thomas Wilson

National Emergency Management Agency (NZ)

About

Prof Tom Wilson is the Chief Science Advisor for the New Zealand National Emergency Management Agency | Te Rākau Whakamarumaru (NEMA).  He is also a Professor of Disaster Risk & Resilience at the University of Canterbury | Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha. 

In the Chief Science Advisor role at NEMA, Tom is focused on supporting the effective use of science within emergency management policy and practice. This includes considering how to more effectively reduce disaster risk and support better disaster recoveries in the long term, as well as how to prepare for and respond to future disasters. Tom’s role also includes supporting partnerships with science organisations and helping to better connect research with policy.

Tom’s research expertise is disaster risk assessment and rural disaster resilience. He has led and been a senior researcher in various large interdisciplinary applied research programmes studying the physical, social and economic impacts of natural hazards (with a focus on volcanoes, earthquakes and tsunami) and developing strategies that can increase disaster resilience in Aotearoa New Zealand, the Pacific and internationally.