Prof Nicholas King is an independent researcher in futures thinking and strategic planning, with over 30 years’ experience in global to
local change analysis. Nick consults and teaches on systems thinking, scenarios development, and leadership needs for the 21st
century, facilitating ‘future-smart’ strategic foresight planning. He works with governments, business, NGOs and local communities in
numerous countries, focusing increasingly on inter-generational equity and the transformative pathways for positive emergence from industrial societal collapse.
Nick’s experience includes contributions to IPCC and IPBES Assessment Reports, being Co- Chair of the Science amp; Policy Advisory Panel for UNEP’s GEO6, and GEO7 launched in December 2025. He was a member of the Science Advisory Panel for the UN’s Global
Synthesis Report: Making Peace with Nature, launched by the UN Secretary General in 2021, and in 2023 was appointed to the UN’s first Global Foresight Panel, which drafted the Navigating New Horizons Report for the UN General Assembly’s ‘Summit for the Future’ in 2024.
Nick was born in Kenya, grew up in South Africa, and has a BSc., BSc Hons (cum laude) and Masters in Ecology from South Africa, PhD in Geography from the USA, and an LLM in International Environmental Law from the UK. He is a former Chief Executive of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), based in Denmark, and the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT) in South Africa and is currently a Board member of three environmental NGOs, namely: the Albertine Rift Conservation Society (ARCOS); Wilderness Foundation Africa (WFA); and Chair of the Board of the Nsasani Trust, an environmental science and education NPO with a purpose-built, experiential-learning campus in the Kruger National Park.