Richard Lindsay was unanimously agreed upon as the first recipient of the award by the IUCN UK Peatland Programme, presented at our 15th annual conference in Northern Ireland. His work in peatlands has spanned almost five decades and he has made a significant contribution to peatland conservation efforts globally. He has worked on peatlands from South America to Asia, but it is his work in the UK’s Flow Country that he is perhaps most well-regarded for. The recognition of the importance of the Flow Country peatlands by Richard and colleagues from the Nature Conservancy Council led to their protection from increasing levels of forestry and ultimately to the inscription of the Flow Country peatlands as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in July 2024, thanks to work of the Flow Country Partnership. 

Richard was Senior Peatland Specialist for the Nature Conservancy Council and successor bodies for 20 years, founding member and Chair of the International Mire Conservation Group for 15 years, and helped to establish the IUCN UK Peatland Programme, where he continues to support us as our Senior Research Advisor.  He has worked at the University of East London for more than two decades, and in that time has taught and inspired countless developing ecologists and peatland scientists.

Richard has authored a significant number of publications on the subject of peatlands, including the highly cited ‘Peatbogs and Carbon’ report. He has developed innovative survey techniques to assess the structural botany of blanket peatlands and supported a network of citizen science monitoring efforts through the development of the ‘Eyes on the Bog’ methodology, which was co-conceived with former IUCN UK Peatland Programme Director Clifton Bain. He is also the architect of our Virtual Peatlands Pavilions and has an unwavering and infectious passion for engaging people with peatlands across the globe and sharing knowledge using innovative digital technologies.

For the inaugural award, we commissioned a unique piece of glass art by an artist local to our 2025 conference venue in Derry, Northern Ireland. Maggie Duffin created a stunning fused glass landscape of a peatland which showcases the colours and wildlife of the landscape and is a fitting tribute to Richard’s creative approaches to sharing his love of peatlands.

It is our intention that each subsequent year to this one, we will invite members of the peatland community to nominate individuals who they feel have made an outstanding contribution either over their career or over that year to the cause of peatland conservation. Members of the IUCN UK Peatland Programme will then compile a shortlist and a winner will be selected from this shortlist. The award will be presented each year at the IUCN UK Peatland Programme annual conference.