Mayo to host 2026 Mary Robinson Climate and Nature Conference
The Mary Robinson Centre in Ballina is inviting communities, researchers, farmers, artists, policymakers, and changemakers from across Ireland and beyond to the Mary Robinson Climate and Nature Conference 2026, taking place on July 9 and 10 in the town.
Under the guiding theme, Food and Care: A Meitheal for Our Time, this two-day conference offers a space where farmers, scientists, activists, artists, and community workers come together not as separate voices but as equals, ready to share, learn, and act.
In the Ireland of old, a meitheal meant neighbours working the land together, sharing labour, knowledge, and care.
The 2026 conference draws on that same spirit, asking a simple but powerful question: what might be possible if researchers, community groups, farmers, climate scientists, biodiversity experts, artists, and carers worked side by side, listening to one another as equals?
This is not a conference of passive audiences. It is a gathering of participants. Every voice is needed!
A Conference Rooted in Place
The main body of the conference will take place at St. Mary's Secondary School, Ballina.
Designed to comply with Nearly Zero Energy Building (NZEB) standards, the school is an exemplar of sustainability, generating its own power via solar panels.
Additional sessions and gatherings will be hosted at The Mary Robinson Centre, Mary Robinson's family home, now a hub for climate justice, human rights, biodiversity conservation, and humanitarian awareness.
Both venues have autism-friendly status, in association with As I Am, and are fully wheelchair accessible.
A National Call for Sessions
Following a national call for sessions, the Mary Robinson Centre is preparing a diverse programme featuring community initiatives, researchers, and activists.
Too often, research remains locked in academic journals while community innovation goes unrecorded. This conference seeks to bridge that divide.
The organisers want the ecologist and the farmer in the same room. The care worker and the policy researcher. The climate scientist and the community activist. Not one informing the other, but both learning together.
Farmers’ Market
Throughout the two days, a vibrant Farmers’ Market will take place outside St. Mary's Secondary School, celebrating local growers, producers, and craftspeople.
It offers delegates and visitors a chance to connect directly with the land and its people: to taste, to talk, and to experience the richness of the region. Open to the general public, the market welcomes local community participation.
In this way, Ballina becomes not simply a backdrop, but a participant.
If you are an organic or sustainable farmer or food vendor and are interested in having a stall at the Farmers’ Market, please visit our website for an application form, and return completed applications to conference@maryrobinsoncentre.ie.
Curlew Award for Excellence in Education for Sustainable Development
The Curlew Awards are a partnership between Atlantic Technology University (ATU), the University of Galway and the Mary Robinson Centre, Ballina.
The awards celebrate and recognize teaching and academic staff in the Atlantic Technological University (ATU) and the University of Galway, who have shown outstanding dedication to Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), through enriching their teaching, inspiring their students, and fostering a culture of interconnected global responsibility.
The awardees will each receive seed funding to support their future ESD practice and scholarship.
On July 9 they will be presented with their award at the 2026 Mary Robinson Climate and Nature Conference.
Conference Co-Chairs
Speakers and facilitators will be welcomed by three co-chairs, each embodying the conference's ethos of connection between research and community:
• Dr. Kevin Lynch (University of Galway) is a climate scientist who has spent years bridging the gap between complex environmental data and the communities who need to use it. He brings rigorous academic insight and a deep commitment to making science accessible, useful and shared.
• Laura Dixon (Mayo County Council) marks a significant first for the conference.
As a Climate Action Officer working on the frontline of local and regional climate action, she represents the voice of place, of policy in practice, and of the community ethos of Ballina.
Her presence grounds the conference in the real work happening on Mayo's streets, farms and shorelines.
• Dr. Karen Bacon (University of Galway) is an expert in plant ecology and biodiversity whose research speaks directly of the land beneath our feet. She brings a careful, patient attention to the natural world and a belief that good science grows best in open conversation and with those who tend the soil.
Together, these three co-chairs represent a deliberate and hopeful mix of academia and community. They will welcome every speaker, every farmer, every student and every carer into a space where all voices are heard as equals.
To support this vision, an induction process will ensure that every facilitator feels welcomed and ready to contribute including those presenting at a conference for the first time.
Confirmed Key-Note Speakers
The 2026 Mary Robinson Climate and Nature Conference is honoured to welcome 12 keynote speakers.
Each brings not only deep expertise but a lived commitment to the work of care, land and justice. These are not distant figures behind lecterns. They are practitioners, listeners and doers.
• Odile La Bolloch (Environmental Protection Agency) brings decades of experience at the intersection of environmental monitoring and public policy. She ensures that Ireland's climate response is shaped by robust science and a just transition for all.
• John Morrissey (University of Galway) is a geographer whose work on climate resilience and community adaptation has bridged the gap between academic models and the real lives of coastal and rural communities.
• Rupa Marya (Trinity College Dublin) is a physician, activist and scholar. Her groundbreaking work on the links between colonialism, health and ecological breakdown has reshaped how we understand the healing; of bodies, lands and systems.
• Jack O'Donovan Trá (Fair Seas) is a leading voice in Ireland's marine conservation movement. He champions the protection of our ocean's biodiversity and the communities whose lives are dependent on healthy seas.
• Anna Davies (Trinity College Dublin) is a world-renowned scholar of sustainable consumption and urban living. Her research has moved from university libraries into neighbourhoods, changing how we think about sharing, waste and everyday choices.
• Sean McCabe (Bohemian Football Club) proves that climate action belongs on every pitch and in every community. As a driving force behind one of Ireland's most progressive football clubs, he brings the energy of grassroots sport into the heart of environmental justice.
• Fiona Doohan (University College Dublin) is a plant scientist whose work on crop resilience and soil health speaks directly to the farmer in the field and the researcher at the bench. She is a bridge between two kinds of knowing.
• Matt Smith (Hometree) has dedicated himself to the restoration of Ireland's native woodlands. He brings together ecologists, landowners and volunteers in a shared act of care for the land.
• Grace Maher (Irish Organic Farmers and Growers Association) speaks from the soil up. A passionate advocate for organic farming, she brings the knowledge of growers who have long understood that healthy food begins with a healthy earth.
• Deirdre deBhailís (Dingle Hub) is a pioneer of remote working and rural revitalisation. She shows that climate action and community resilience go hand in hand, and that the West of Ireland has a powerful story to tell.
• Alice Doyle (Irish Farmers' Association) represents the voice of Irish farming at a time of profound change. Her work bridges tradition and transformation, ensuring that farmers are not the bystanders to climate policy but the shapers of it.
• Molly Garvey (Nuffield Ireland) is a young farmer and agricultural leader. Her international perspective and deep local roots offer a hopeful, practical vision for the future of food and nature.
Together, these 12 speakers do not simply deliver lectures. They enter the meitheal. They come to listen as much as to speak, to learn alongside farmers, carers, activists and researchers.
Their excellence is not measured in citations alone. It is measured in their willingness to share what they know, and to leave changed by what they hear.
Ticket Information
Tickets are available online from the conference website.
To make the conference as inclusive as possible, a limited number of concession tickets are available for students and members of the public in receipt of the Old Age Pension, Carers Allowance, Disability Allowance,or social welfare payments.
In addition, the Mary Robinson Centre will have a limited number of complimentary tickets for speakers and facilitators selected by the co-chairs who may be students or volunteers for the NGO or charity they represent.