Staff - Meet the team

Chris Howe Executive Director

Chris Howe

Chris leads the WWF-New Zealand team in its mission to build a future where people live in harmony with nature.
He is responsible for its conservation programme direction and financial accountability. He has been part of the WWF-New Zealand team for over seven years, formerly as its Conservation Director.
Chris’s lifelong commitment to protecting the natural world has seen him campaigning internationally to end commercial whaling, representing WWF at three International Whaling Commission meetings, to directing the campaign to protect New Zealand's endangered Hector's and Maui's dolphins.

Linda Walsh, Payroll and Accounts Officer

Linda Walsh

Linda has worked for WWF-New Zealand for the past eight years as Accounts and Payroll Officer. She plays a vital role in ensuring the smooth running of financial accounting systems and is responsible for Inland Revenue reporting as well as monitoring the organisation's carbon emissions/carbon neutral status.

Peggy Munn, Operations Manager

Peggy Munn

Peggy’s role covers finance, human resources and IT. She is responsible for financial reporting to the Board and preparation of the annual financial statements for audit. She also manages the recruitment process for all new staff, ongoing development of good HR practice within WWF and oversight of IT support.

Winifred Clarke, Supporter Services Administrator

Winifred Clarke

Winifred provides overall administrative support to the WWF-New Zealand team with a focus on updating the supporter database, and processing donations received through the post and from our website. As Winifred is at reception she provides the first point of contact for all callers to WWF.

Selar Henderson, Fundraising Manager

Selar Henderson

Selar, as Fundraising Manager, is responsible for all of WWF-New Zealand's fundraising programmes. This includes communicating with our valued individual supporters, corporate and trust partners, as well as working closely with community-driven fundraising initiatives.

Wendy Barry, Education Programme Leader

Wendy Barry

Wendy’s role is to lead all of the Education work for WWF. This includes administering the Environmental Education Fund which distributes $60,000 to schools and community groups every year; producing Environmental Education resources for teachers ; providing training workshops for other providers; and advocating for sustainability to be central to all young New Zealanders school experience.

Rebecca Bird, Marine Programme Manager

Rebecca Bird

Rebecca has been marine programme manager for WWF-New Zealand since January 2007, working on campaigns, policy developments and community initiatives in four key areas. She heads up the work on protecting Maui’s and Hector’s dolphins and other native threatened species, including sea lions, seabirds and sharks. She also leads the Antarctic and Southern Ocean programme to ensure the ecosystem’s integrity is preserved and seabirds and other wildlife are protected; on sustainable fisheries to reduce bycatch and encourage sustainable fishing practices, including managing WWF-NZ’s involvement with the Marine Stewardship Council; and advocating for a network of marine protected areas to preserve the nation’s marine environment and biodiversity.

Victoria Travers, Auckland Marine Matters programme manager

Victoria Travers

Victoria joined WWF in May 2008 as Maui's Dolphin Education Coordinator, and in 2010 took up the role of Programme Manager for Auckland Marine Matters.

Gemma McGrath, Hector’s dolphin community coordinator

Gemma McGrath

Gemma, our South Island Hector's dolphin community coordinator, is currently on maternity leave.

Jenny Riches, Marketing and Communications Manager

Jen Riches Marketing and Communications Manager WWF-New Zealand

What do communications and marketing people actually do? Like all WWF staff, ours come to work to protect our living planet.

Jen works with our programme team to get campaign messages out - from asking people to support action on climate change through WWF's Earth Hour, to giving our Government the message that New Zealanders want them to save Hector's dolphins from extinction. She also works with our fundraising manager to keep our supporters well-informed about the big environmental issues that we tackle on their behalf, and manages WWF's brand.

Rosa Argent, Communications Manager

Rosa Argent

Rosa is WWF-New Zealand's Communications Manager. Her job involves working closely with all of the conservation teams to communicate their complex programme areas to a wide range of important audiences, including the media. She loves elephants, and hates jargon.

Lee Barry, Climate Change Campaigner

Lee Barry

Lee is part of WWF-New Zealand’s Climate Change team and handles public outreach. Her role combines communications and campaigning to inspire people to take action on climate change, including leading our '100% Possible' advocates for renewable energy.

Peter Hardstaff, Climate Change campaigner

Peter Hardstaff

Peter joined WWF-New Zealand in August 2008. As Climate Change Programme Manager, Peter’s job is to develop and implement a strategy so that WWF-New Zealand can play a constructive role in encouraging individuals, businesses and the government to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to climate change. This involves working with a variety of partners in New Zealand as well as colleagues in the WWF international network.

Marc Slade, Terrestrial Conservation Programme Manager

Marc Slade

Marc is responsible for WWF-NZ' s terrestrial and freshwater conservation programme, including administering the Habitat Protection Fund. Marc is also developing a work programme around conservation at a landscape scale, working with communities, landowners, councils and businesses to restore our "living landscapes" so that they can help our indigenous biodiversity adapt to climate change.

Bob Zuur, Marine Advocate

Bob Zuur

Bob is a marine biologist in WWF- New Zealand’s marine protection team.

Ruchika Jayatilaka, Fundraising Manager (Supporter Relations)

Ruchika Jayatilaka

Ruchika is responsible for establishing and maintaining quality relations with our supporters, through various WWF-New Zealand's fundraising programmes. Together with Selar, she also carries out annual fundraising plans to help grow the organisation's income and supporter base.