David Suzuki

Topics

Presentations

The Sacred Balance-Rediscovering Our Place in Nature

The Challenge of the 21st Century: Setting the Real Bottom Line

Summary Profile

Dr. David Suzuki, Chair of the David Suzuki Foundation, is an award-winning  scientist, environmentalist and broadcaster. He is renowned for his radio and television programs that explain the complexities of the natural sciences in a compelling, easily understood way.

Dr. Suzuki is a geneticist. He graduated from Amherst College  (Massachusetts) with an Honours BA in Biology, followed by a Ph.D. in Zoology from the University of Chicago. He is currently Professor Emeritus of The University of British Columbia, Sustainable Development Research Institute. 

In 1972, he was awarded the E.W.R. Steacie Memorial Fellowship for the outstanding research scientist in Canada under the age of 35. He has won numerous academic awards and holds 16 honourary degrees in Canada, the U.S. and Australia. A member of the Royal Society of Canada and the Order of Canada, Dr. Suzuki has written over 40 books, including 17 for children. His 1976 textbook An Introduction to Genetic Analysis (with A.J.F. Griffiths), remains the most widely used genetics text book in the U.S. and has been translated into Italian, Spanish, Greek, Indonesian, Arabic, French and German.

Dr. Suzuki has received consistently high acclaim for his thirty years of award-winning work in broadcasting. In 1974 he developed and hosted the long running popular science program Quirks and Quarks on CBC Radio. He has since presented two influential documentary CBC radio series on the environment, It’s a Matter of Survival and From Naked Ape to Superspecies. His television career began on CBC in 1971 when he wrote and hosted Suzuki on Science. He then created and hosted a number of television specials, and in 1979 became the host of the award-winning The Nature of Things with David Suzuki. He has won four Gemini Awards as best host of a Canadian television series for The Nature of Things, which he has been with for 20 of the 40 seasons they have been on air. His eight part television series, A Planet for the Taking, won an award from the United Nations. His eight part PBS series, The Secret of Life, was praised internationally, as was his five part series The Brain for the Discovery Channel.  In 2002, Dr. Suzuki was honoured with the John Drainie Award for broadcasting excellence. 

Dr. Suzuki is also recognized as a world leader in sustainable ecology. He is the recipient of NESCO’s Kalinga Prize for Science, the United Nations Environment Program Medal and the Global 500. He is a fellow of the American Association of the Advancement of Science.

Client Testimonials:

"He is an inspiring speaker who shows where society can make changes that will matter to everyone."

Penn State University

"The relevance of your views regarding why we have removed oursleves from the natural world and now live in a mosiac of disconnected fragments so that we no longer see what our responsibilities are has given our participants many new ideas to take back to their districts on how to meet these challenges."

British Columbia School Superintendents Assocation