TALKS
Bonnie Nixon, PhD | Environmental Evangelist & Human Rights Advocate
Every purchase we make carries hidden costs: ecosystems destroyed, and 28 million people trapped in modern slavery. For over four decades, Dr. Bonnie Nixon has worked inside some of the world’s largest companies—HP, Walmart, Mattel—and alongside groundbreaking water, waste, energy, and transportation initiatives to confront these staggering truths. A sustainability pioneer and Professor of Sustainable Supply Chain at USC and UCLA, she has seen both the exploitation and the opportunities that shape our global economy.
In her TEDx talk, Nixon urges us to stop thinking in terms of supply chains and start demanding supply change. She challenges us to recognize consumption as a civic responsibility, one with the power to preserve ecosystems, end human exploitation, and align commerce with conscience. With urgency and hope, she shows us how accountability—corporate and personal—can transform our global networks into engines of justice and sustainability.
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Dr. Bonnie Nixon has held many high-profile positions at the global forefront of a new low-carbon, resource-protected, and just economy as Director of Global Sustainability at Hewlett-Packard for 13 years, Executive Director for the Walmart-led Sustainability Consortium, Director of Corporate Responsibility for Mattel Toys, and Senior Partner at ERM. Today, she leads the Net Zero 2030 Climate Action Strategy at the Long Beach Container Terminal in Southern California—the greenest marine shipping terminal in the world. Bonnie spent two decades leading complex community environmental programs for large-scale infrastructure (transportation, energy, water, wastewater, land use, solid and hazardous waste) with regional, state, and federal government agencies. Dr. Nixon is a Professor of Sustainable Supply Chain at USC and UCLA and obtained a Bachelor’s Degree from Pennsylvania State University, a Master’s Degree in Learning Technologies, and a PhD in Global Leadership and Change at Pepperdine University on the intersection of environmental justice and modern slavery in complex supply chains.
