Jane Davidson

Jane Davidson was Minister for Environment and Sustainability in Wales from 2007 to 2011 where she was responsible for the Welsh Government agreeing to make sustainable development its central organising principle. Prior to that she was Minister for Education and Lifelong Learning where she introduced a new Foundation Phase for 3-7 year olds, the Welsh Baccalaureate and introduced ESDGC into the Welsh curriculum.

Jane is passionate about the environment and resource efficiency and has been given a number of accolades for her work. She was the third most influential environmentalist in the UK for the Independent on Sunday in 2009 and has been Resource magazine's no 1 and 2 in 2009 and 2010 for her work on waste which has seen Wales come from behind the rest of the UK to be the lead recycling country in Britain and the first UK country to charge for single use carrier bags. She holds honorary fellowships from CIW (Chartered Institute of Waste) and CIWEM (Chartered Institute of Water and Environmental Management) and has recently joined WWF's UK Council of Global Ambassadors. She was a judge on last year's Green Awards and is a member of the Telegraph's summit team writing about the green economy in the run up to Rio+20. She has recently been awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Glamorgan for her work.

Last autumn, she took on a new role as Director of a new sustainability institute, INSPIRE, (Institute for Sustainability Practice, Innovation and Resource Effectiveness) in University of Wales, Trinity Saint David, which intends to introduce sustainability content into every student's experience from 2013.

Jane is a keen walker and is delighted to have been elected President of Ramblers Cymru to support the development of the 870 mile Wales Coast Path due to open in May 2012.