Sustainability researcher wins $1.5m award

Associate Professor Arunima Malik has been announced as one of The Frontiers Planet Prize’s three 2025 International Champions, receiving the award for her paper ‘Polarising and equalising trends in international trade and Sustainable Development Goals’, published in Nature Sustainability.

The Frontiers Planet Prize, a global initiative of the Frontiers Research Foundation in Switzerland, awarded her US$1 million (AU$1.54 million) to advance her and her research team’s pioneering work in sustainability science, which is believed to be the largest individual monetary prize for research in the university’s history.

By providing scalable solutions to help keep humanity within planetary sustainability boundaries, the paper represents years of work by Malik and colleagues at the University of Sydney Centre for Integrated Sustainability Analysis. Malik’s work focuses on understanding how consumption in one country affects the environment and society of its trading partners, with the goal of informing national and trade policies to mitigate negative impacts and address climate-related issues.

The centre, established by Professor Manfred Lenzen, has pioneered big-data modelling techniques to quantify sustainability impacts. The work has been used to measure pathways of modern slavery, inequality in international trade and carbon footprints in multiple industries, including tourism. Malik holds a joint position with the Faculty of Science and the Business School.

“We live in an increasingly interconnected world driven by complex supply chain networks, where consumer demand in one region influences production in another,” Malik said. “These interconnections present opportunities to improve standards of living, skill development and employment generation, but also generate adverse impacts in the form of resource depletion, pollution, habitat loss and inequality.

“International trade can amplify these effects by placing pressure on vulnerable nations, leading to spillover effects that hinder countries’ ability to progress toward the UN Sustainable Development Goals.”

The President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Sydney, Professor Mark Scott, said he was delighted by the award.

“At the University of Sydney, we’ve been aware of the excellent work that Associate Professor Malik and her colleagues have been undertaking. It’s wonderful that a prestigious panel of international peers has now given it due recognition,” he said. “The work the university is doing on sustainability around our collective benchmarks set by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals is something we are proud of. Associate Professor Malik is a true global leader in this field and her prize is richly deserved.”

Malik was selected by the Australian Academy of Science as one of Australia’s top-three entries this year and in April was named as the Australian Champion by the Frontiers Planet Prize. The prize money needs to be spent on research and will serve as a grant for advancing sustainability research and translation.

The two other International Champions were Professor Zahra Kalantari from KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden, and Dr Zia Mehrabi from the University of Colorado Boulder, USA.

“It’s an honour and a privilege to receive this recognition and support from the Frontiers Planet Prize. Overall, the prize provides inspiration that drives sustainable solutions for planetary health. This is vital as we search for innovation and action in the face of global environmental challenges,” Malik said. “The US$1 million award will significantly accelerate our ability to expand our research and further highlight the positive and negative impacts of global trade around the world.

“With these resources, we can advance research with policy-relevant insights, and develop tools to inform sustainable solutions, especially in contexts where climate vulnerability and economic inequality intersect.

“The award is a testament to the successful interdisciplinary collaboration across multiple institutions and reflects the commitment of all authors in realising this important research.

“I take this opportunity to thank the research team, Professor Manfred Lenzen, Dr Mengyu Li, Camille Mora, Dr Sarah Carter, Dr Stefan Giljum, Dr Stephan Lutter and Professor Jorge Gomez-Paredes for their valuable contributions.”

This year’s Frontiers Planet Prize Award Ceremony was hosted by the Villars Institute as part of the 2025 Villars Symposium in Villars-sur-Ollon, Switzerland. The three International Champions were selected from a group of 19 National Champions chosen by an independent jury of 100 renowned sustainability and planetary health experts, chaired by Professor Johan Rockström.

Image caption: In Switzerland, Associate Professor Arunima Malik (centre) receives the Frontiers Planet Prize from Professor Jean-Claude Burgelman, Director, Frontiers Planet Prize (left); and Professor Dr Johan Rockström, Chair of the Jury 100, Frontiers Planet Prize, and Director, Potsdam Institute of Climate Impact Research. Image credit: Oliver O'Hanlon.