ABOUT

Meet Emily King

Cultivating change through Spira

My vision is to lead food systems change in Aotearoa and sow seeds for businesses and organisations to do the same.

Growing up on a dairy farm under the mighty Taranaki Maunga, it’s not surprising I was instilled with an intrinsic connection to the land from a very young age. 

Connecting this appreciation for nature to a career path, I was confident I had found my ‘why’ when studying environmental science and law at university. But while a legal career helped me learn a lot about local government and regulation, I was deeply driven by climate change, and wanted to do more to advocate for positive action.

Following years of study abroad researching food systems, working alongside NGOs and eventually returning to Aotearoa New Zealand, I created Spira in 2017 to inspire and enable change right across the food system. The problems our planet is facing are pressing, and I’m driven by an urgency to inspire more people to understand their role in taking action on climate change, environmental and health problems, and how the food system can do that.

Food can connect people; it’s central to our communities and our cultures. And because of that, I believe it’s a critical mobiliser for change. Through advocacy, speaking, training and consultancy, I now help people understand the bigger picture of climate change, and then show them a pathway through it with more sustainable systems and solutions.

I’m just getting started

I was named one of Food Tank’s top 20 global food leaders under 40, and one of the Top 50 Women in Food and Drink Aotearoa New Zealand 2024, for my work restoring our food system. I’ve judged the Outstanding New Zealand Food Producer awards sustainability category for the past seven years, have helped set up The Kitchen Project, Kai Waiheke, and facilitated the New Zealand Government’s Food Summit Dialogues in the lead up to the UN Food System Summit 2021. I’ve also written Re-food, published June 2023, to share my thoughts and learnings to cultivate change in our food system.

I started Spira Food System Academy to provide more Aotearoa businesses with unprecedented access to insights and training with a local context that can help them do their part as food producers, suppliers, vendors and consumers. I hope you can join me in the trainings to help the food system transformation we need.