Matthew Baird

Matthew was called to the NSW Bar in 1991. He has been involved in the area of environmental law since 1987. Since 2010 he has worked in ASEAN, providing environmental legal advice on a range of environmental and social governance (ESG) matters. He has worked in most of the ASEAN countries providing advice on legislation and ESG and has worked with UN Environment, UNDP, ADB, IFC, WB, WWF, Vermont Law School and Earthrights International. In particular, he was worked with ADB on judicial capacity development in environmental and climate change adjudication since 2013. He has participated in judicial workshops in Bhutan, Cambodia, Myanmar, the Philippines, and Thailand.

He has run many climate litigation cases in Australia and has lectured on nuclear energy law, transboundary EIA law and environmental crime and enforcement. He has also presented training sessions for judges in a number of ASEAN countries and assisted ADB in the Train the Trainers program for capacity development for environmental law academics in Asia. He is the Deputy Chair of LAWASIA’s Environmental Law Committee and a Visiting Scholar in Vermont Law School.