Niche and Ausecology has expanded its Land Restoration team with the appointment of Megan Lewis as General Manager.
The 30-strong team delivers large-scale land restoration services for conservation, biodiversity offset and carbon projects to rebuild nature, including planting, rehabilitation, regeneration, and management activities across Queensland and New South Wales.
The Land Restoration team manages more than 15,000 hectares of land and has planted over 200,000 native trees through Ausecology and parent company Niche’s work for businesses, government and landholder.
Megan brings significant experience to the team from environmental management roles in the not-for-profit and mining sectors where she shaped environmental strategy, delivered large‑scale biodiversity initiatives and provided guidance in challenging operational contexts.
In her role at Ausecology, Megan will lead the Land Restoration unit, overseeing multidisciplinary teams to deliver high‑quality, evidence‑based outcomes for clients across includes large‑scale biodiversity and natural resource management programs.
“I’m excited to join such a skilled and experienced team of restoration practitioners, bringing my operational and leadership expertise to help scale our work and expand into new markets. We will be focused on growing our portfolio of biodiversity offset sites under management, providing specialist services such as ecological burns, and expanding our large-scale tree planting initiatives into emerging carbon and nature markets.”
With nature risks and opportunities increasingly a focus in boardrooms across Australia and the world, Niche’s Managing Director Ian Rollins believes there is significant opportunity for nature restoration services.
“The well-established biodiversity offsets space, as well as emerging nature and carbon markets, present exciting opportunities for the private sector to help repair and rebuild nature. For nature projects to achieve credible and enduring outcomes, they must have strong foundations in ecological science and be designed with practical on-ground delivery in mind.”
“With our combined Land Restoration, Natural Capital and Ecology teams across the east coast, we have over 120 experts with experience from strategy through to long-term management of large-scale environmental projects. We will continue expanding our team and capability in this space and working with clients to deliver meaningful nature restoration at scale.”
Land restoration and management is critical for conservation projects, biodiversity offset sites and carbon projects to meet project outcomes and achieve long-term nature positive impacts. The Land Restoration services offered by Ausecology and Niche include:
- Large-scale seeding and planting.
- Ecological restoration programs.
- Biodiversity offset site management.
- Ecological fire management
- Invasive species management
Ausecology has been delivering ecology, biodiversity offset and land restoration services since 2011, specialising in the resources, infrastructure, energy and renewables sectors.