Ian Convery is Professor of Environment & Society at the University of Cumbria, where he leads on the Back on our Map (BOOM) multi-species reintroduction project. He is also Director of the Lifescape Project conservation NGO. Ian has spent the last 25 years working on understanding societal interactions with, connections to, and perceptions of, the ‘natural world’. His current interests are focused on public engagement with species reintroductions and rewilding, and he is the PI on the HLF funded ‘Back on our Map’ (BOOM) multi-species reintroduction project in South Cumbria. He established and co-chairs the IUCN CEM Rewilding Thematic Group and has been a member of the IUCN World Commission for Protected Areas since 2016. Ian is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and is a Director of the Lifescapes Project conservation charity, which owns and manages the Natural Capital Laboratory in collaboration with AECOM. He has worked in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bolivia, Ethiopia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mozambique and Tanzania.