Katja Phutaraksa Neef

Katja has recently completed her Bachelor’s in Global Studies majoring in Sustainable Development and the Global Environment and will soon begin her BA Honours in Geography supported by the Kupe Leadership Scholarship she has been awarded.

Katja is half German and half Thai and has lived in both Thailand and Japan before moving to Aotearoa.

She is passionate about issues concerning institutionalised racism, criticisms of ethnography and misrepresentations, environmental issues, structural violence, post-disaster recovery, migration, climate change, land exploitation and dispossession, conflicts and social justice, intersectional feminism, refugees, indigenous and marginalized communities.

Katja is co-convenor of the Generation Zero Group at the University of Auckland.

She wants to work towards an inclusive society by promoting and advocating for climate justice by amplifying Indigenous Pacific voices and acknowledging Indigenous knowledge systems.