Recipients

2021

Richard McDowell for his outstanding contributions to the knowledge of contaminant loses from land to water and informing environmental policy.

2020

Neil Gemmell for fundamentally changing our understanding of animal ecology and evolution and driving the development of new approaches for conservation and management of the world’s rarest species. 

2019

Philip Hulme for his outstanding contributions to the knowledge of plant invasions in New Zealand, especially his innovative insights in why and how non-native plants become invasive weeds.

2018

Bruce Hayward for outstanding contributions to the knowledge of New Zealand's marine ecology and geology.

2017

Roger Cooper for his contributions to understanding the geological foundations and the earliest organisms of Zealandia and beyond and for his role in maintaining and developing paleobiology expertise in New Zealand, which uses rocks to study ancient biology

2016

Wendy Nelson for her significant contributions to understanding the diversity, biology and evolution of marine macroalgae

2015

Lionel Carter for his career-long contributions to marine geology in New Zealand through fundamental investigations of sea-floor geological processes and their application to assessment of hazards and resources

2014

Not awarded

2013

Dave Kelly for developing knowledge of native flora in New Zealand and defining the key interactions between plants and animals. He has made long-term studies of South Island ecosystems, including decade-long studies to understand ‘mast seeding’ where plant species synchronise production of an unusually large seed crop

2012

R. Ewan Fordyce for his seminal contributions in New Zealand vertebrate paleontology, particularly for whales, dolphins and penguins

2011

Robert Poulin for his leading research in the field of parasitic diseases, especially for his work in ecological parasitology, an area of particular relevance to New Zealand’s marine and freshwater ecosystems

2010

David Galloway for his significant contributions to understanding the New Zealand environment, particularly through his botanical work on New Zealand lichens

2009

Colin Wilson for his outstanding work on volcanism

2008

Bryce Buddle for his world-leading research into controlling infectious animal diseases

2006

Colin James Webb for major contributions to plant systematics and evolutionary biology

2004

Campbell Symes Nelson for major contributions in the fields of sedimentology and paleoclimate research

2002

Roger Morris for his outstanding contribution to the advancement of animal science as a veterinarian and epidemiologist

2000

Henry Eamonn Connor and Elizabeth Edgar for their extremely meritorious contributions to the botanical classification and documentation of New Zealand’s flora

1999

Hugh Mannering Bibby for fundamental contributions to earth sciences in earth deformation analysis and geo-electrical prospecting

1998

Alan Henry Kirton for his outstanding contribution to meat science and technology

1997

Alan Francis Mark

1996

Richard John Norris for his major impact on the understanding of geologial processes at the continental (New Zealand) plate boundary

1995

Geoffrey Thomas Sandford Baylis

1992

George Hodge Scott

1989

Rufus Michael Grant Wells

1986

Eric John Godley

1983

Richard Patrick Suggate

1980

George Alexander Knox

1977

William Raymond Philipson

1974

Maxwell Gage

1971

Raymond Robert Forster

1968

Norcott de Bisson Hornibrook

1965

Lucy Beatrice Moore

1962

Howard Barraclough Fell

1959

Laurence Robert Richardson

1956

Charles Alexander Fleming

1953

John Marwick

1950

Walter Reginald Brook Oliver

1947

Charles Andrew Cotton

1944

William Noel Benson

1941

Harry Howard Allan

1938

David Miller

1935

Gordon Herriot Cunningham

1932

John Arthur Bartrum

1929

George Vernon Hudson

1926

Charles Chilton

1923

James Allan Thomson

1920

John Ernest Holloway

1917

Patrick Marshall

1914

Leonard Cockayne

1911

William Blaxland Benham