Dr Jan Sinclair is a science communication specialist and a researcher on the impact of climate change policies.
Her extensive science communication expertise includes drafting popular versions of the IPCC climate change impacts reports for the United Nations Environment Programme, and working with Pacific Island countries to reduce climate change risks.
A former science journalist, she first wrote about climate change for The Dominion newspaper in the late 1980s, and in the early 1990s for The Observer and New Scientist in the UK.
She encourages media and policy makers to be better informed about climate change science so that strategic planning for extreme weather events will ensure communities are prepared.
But at grassroots level, she says ordinary people are aware of the issue simply through observing changes to their immediate environment and seasons, such as earlier blooming flowers, or the changes to migratory birds’ departure and arrival times.