About the U.K. Associates of BIOS

Chris Day, Chairman
Chris Day has been on the board of the U.K. Associates of BIOS since 2008 and Chairman since 2016. A City Liveryman and former investment banker with a passion for marine environmental issues, Chris ensures that the U.K. Associates of BIOS maintains close links with institutions and leading businesses in the City of London. A former British Sub-Aqua Club Branch Chairman, he continues to be a very active scuba diver, exploring waters both around the U.K. and overseas.

Lady Judy Vereker, Vice-Chair
Lady Vereker is Vice-Chair of the U.K. Associates of BIOS, having joined the Board in 2014. She sat on the main Board of BIOS as a Trustee from 2004-2022; and then was appointed a Trustee of the Arizona State University (ASU) BIOS Advisory Board, with specific responsibilities on its Development Committee, when the two institutions merged. She has a close involvement with several Bermudian organizations, particularly in the areas of the environment and the arts which began while her husband was Governor of Bermuda during 2002-2007. She helped to found Polka Theatre for Children in London in 1979 and, as its Development Director until 2002, was recipient of many arts and business awards for creating innovative and mutually beneficial partnerships. Between 2010-2019 she served on the Board of the Mozartists, a leading U.K. period-instrument orchestra and since 2008, she has been a Director on The Bermuda Society Board.

Chip Cunliffe
Chip Cunliffe joined the U.K. Associates of BIOS Board in 2018 and is currently the Programme and Risk Director of the Ocean Risk and Resilience Action Alliance (ORRAA). Prior to this he spent 10 years working in the insurance industry, identifying ways in which risk transfer mechanisms and finance solutions can be best used to build resilience to ocean related risks. He established AXA’s Ocean Risk Initiative which included developing and launching a Coastal Risk Index to integrate coastal ecosystems into insurance risk models; worked with partners to develop the scientific basis to create a mangrove insurance product; as well as identified insurance pathways to prevent Illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing. Chip championed the importance of increasing ocean literacy through AXA XL’s Ocean Education and Ocean Risk Scholarships programs. And when he was Sustainable Development Director at XL Catlin, he helped organise the first Ocean Risk Summit in Bermuda, in May 2018.

Nick Pewter
Nick Pewter joined CelsiusPro, a Swiss insurtech company in 2022 as Business Development Manager, focusing on global parametric and climate risk solutions. Previously, he spent six years at Willis Re, working as a wholesale broker. Before that, Nick was based in Bermuda working as a reinsurance underwriter. He is a BIOS Alumnus, having completed an internship in 1997. He joined the U.K. Associates of BIOS Board in 2018. He was born and educated in Bermuda before he studied at the University of Vermont, graduating with a BS in Community Development and Applied Economics.

Professor Richard Lampitt
Professor Richard Lampitt is an observational biogeochemist at the National Oceanography Centre (NOC) addressing the factors that control the downward flux of material from the top of the ocean into the interior and from there to the seabed. This flux is central to the issue of global warming as it removes a substantial part of the atmospheric carbon dioxide which has been generated by mankind. He has a strong interest in issues of direct societal concern; and in 2012 he established and now leads the Microplastics Research Group at NOC. Plastic pollution may prove to have a seriously damaging effect on the structure and function of ocean ecosystems, although there are many outstanding scientific issues still to be resolved. He has been involved in both the science needed to address this issue and changes to national and global policy to reduce the level of pollution and the damage caused. He has been a Trustee of the U.K. Associates of BIOS Board since 2002.

Suzanne Ferlic Johnson
Suzanne Ferlic Johnson, a Trustee of the U.K. Associates of BIOS Board since 2020, is interested in advancing the private sector’s contribution towards the Sustainable Development Goals, especially with regards to the ocean economy. Suzanne is Senior Advisor to the UN Global Compact and its work to advance a more sustainable ocean economy. In particular, she leads the Ocean Finance work for the UN Global Compact’s Ocean Stewardship Coalition. Suzanne is Senior Advisor to the Lloyd's Register Foundation and sits on the Lloyd's Register Advisory Board. She has wide-ranging experience in the energy sector, having previously worked for energy and water companies in government and regulatory affairs, investor relations and finance. She has also worked in investment management at Schroders where she managed fixed income investing for the European utility sector. Early in her career, Suzanne served as special assistant to Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick, former permanent representative from the United States to the United Nations.  She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a Governor of the Ditchley Foundation, and a member of the William Pitt circle at Chatham House.

Ian Arnold
Ian is a Liveryman of the Fishmongers’ Company and has been the Honorary Treasurer of the U.K. Associates of BIOS since 2008, and was appointed as a Trustee in 2024. He is a retired chartered accountant who qualified with Price Waterhouse in London; and spent most of his career working in senior management roles in the retail industry. In addition to managing our finances and accounting, Ian also provides the Board with much needed support and advice on regulatory matters, notably with respect to the Charities Commission.

Richard Beckett 
Richard Beckett became Independent Examiner of the U.K. Associates of BIOS in 2016. He is a retired chartered accountant and held a senior management role for over 30 years at Hughes Allen (now part of MacIntyre Hudson) in a technical and advisory capacity.

Emeritus Professor Michael Depledge CBE FRS FRCP
Professor Michael Depledge is an expert in oceans and human health issues and marine ecotoxicology. He was the founding Director of the Plymouth Environmental Research Centre and spent four years as Chief Scientific Advisor to the U.K. Environment Agency. He has been the Chief Science Advisor at Plymouth Marine Laboratory, a member of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution, a board member of the Natural Environment Research Council, and a founding board member of Natural England. He is currently Emeritus Professor of Environment and Human Health at the European Centre for Environment and Human Health which he founded at the University of Exeter Medical School, a Special Advisor at the Eden Project and Chair of the Science Advisory Committee for the Convex Seascape Survey. He also serves as an expert advisor to the U.K. Government, the World Health Organisation and the UNEP.

Professor Christopher Carbone
Professor Chris Carbone was a Biological Oceanography summer course student at BIOS in 1992, supported by the U.K. Associates of BIOS. His son, Dylan, followed in his footsteps and was a U.K. Associates of BIOS Coral Reef Ecology summer course student while he was an undergraduate studying at Swansea University in 2019. Chris has since gone on to enjoy a highly successful career as a scientific ecologist and is Professor at the Institute of Zoology at the Zoological Society of London (ZSL). His research explores broad scale patterns in ecology with projects examining human-wildlife interactions particularly focusing on the impacts of altered landscapes on wildlife ecology and species richness. In addition to his role as Professor at the IOZ, Chris holds roles as Doctoral Training Programmes Coordinator, Senior Management Board Member, was on the Covid Working Group and Member and Founder of London Hogwatch.

Chris Leftwich
Chris Leftwich originally trained as an environmental health officer and became the head of fisheries at the Fishmongers' Company in 1985, a post he held until his retirement in 2016. During that time, he ran training courses on various aspects of fisheries in Asia, Africa and the EU on behalf of bodies such as the EU and the UN. He also served a two-year term as the world president of the International Association of Fish Inspectors. In 2000 he set up the Billingsgate Seafood Training School and still serves on its board of trustees. Since retirement from full time work, Chris has undertaken many consultancies on fishery related matters and is also the current chairman of the Shellfish Association of Great Britain.

Diana Viscountess Dunrossil
Diana Viscountess Dunrossil was invited to join BIOS UK in 1990 by founding trustee Max Bruce. She had lived in Bermuda from 1983 to 1988 with her late husband Viscount Dunrossil, who was Governor at the time. After returning to the UK, she enrolled at University College London and graduated in 1990 with a Post Graduate Diploma in International Law majoring in Law of the Sea and Environmental Law. In September that year, she became Legal Officer at ACOPS (Advisory Committee on Protection of the Sea) where she worked on the organisation's submission on Land based sources of Marine Pollution prepared for the 1992 Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro.