Xuemei Bai has won 2018 Volvo Environment Prize. Photo: Lannon Harley
The Australian National University's Professor Xuemei Bai has been awarded this year's Volvo Environment Prize for her pioneering work on urbanisation, and urban system sustainability in Asia and globally. The Volvo Environmental Prize is one of the most prestigious global awards recognising outstanding scientific discoveries in environment or sustainability fields. Professor Bai from ANU Fenner School of Environment and Society said urbanisation is one of the biggest social transformations of our time. With more than two thirds of the world's population expected to live in urban areas by 2050, Professor Bai's research focuses on understanding the drivers and impacts of urbanization, cities as human dominant complex systems, and sustainability transition, with particular focus in Asia and the "Global south". Cities that are growing at rapid rates, such as Lagos in Nigeria and Guangshou in China, are struggling to keep up with the environmental pressures of population growth. "It is often said sustainability will be won and lost in the cities. I would go one step further and say that sustainability will be won or lost in cities in the Global South," Professor Bai said.
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