Jo Chandler (Melbourne-based) is a Walkley Award-winning journalist specializing in climate justice reporting across Pacific Island nations. Her current work for The Monthly and Griffith Review combines immersive fieldwork with rigorous analysis of environmental policy impacts on Indigenous communities.
Access recent work through her professional portfolio or University of Melbourne research profile. Pitches requiring PNG/Australia field coordination should allow 6-8 week lead time for ethical clearance processes.
Jo Chandler has forged a distinguished career spanning three decades as an investigative journalist specializing in climate narratives, environmental crises, and human rights. Beginning as a cadet on regional Australian newspapers, she rose to become a senior writer at The Age before transitioning to freelance work for international outlets including The Guardian, The New York Times, and The Atlantic. Her reporting methodology combines immersive fieldwork with rigorous scientific analysis, particularly focused on Papua New Guinea and Pacific Island nations.
This 2023 investigative piece dissects the complex intersection of rising sea levels, cultural preservation, and international climate financing mechanisms in Solomon Islands communities. Chandler spent six weeks embedded with Indigenous leaders documenting both traditional adaptation strategies and conflicts arising from carbon offset projects. The article’s groundbreaking revelation of "green colonialism" patterns in REDD+ initiatives sparked parliamentary inquiries into Australia’s climate aid programs.
Chandler’s 2022 Eureka Prize-winning work follows glaciologists extracting million-year-old ice cores from Antarctica. Blending historical research with frontline reporting, she contextualizes paleoclimatology data within contemporary policy debates. The article’s innovative narrative structure – alternating between laboratory analysis and field camp diaries – has been cited as a model for science communication.
This 2025 disaster reportage piece exemplifies Chandler’s ability to synthesize immediate crisis coverage with longitudinal analysis of tribal conflict dynamics and infrastructure neglect. By cross-referencing satellite imagery with oral histories from survivors, she constructs a multidimensional account that challenges simplistic climate disaster narratives.
Chandler’s work consistently centers individual experiences within macro-environmental shifts, as seen in her documentation of PNG women measuring coastal erosion using ancestral tidal markers. Effective pitches should propose subjects with direct lived experience of climate impacts, particularly from underserved Pacific communities.
Her award-winning TB reporting demonstrates how to bridge health and environmental journalism. Pitches connecting climate change to unexpected sectors like infectious disease patterns or mental health epidemiology will resonate, especially with supporting data from peer-reviewed research.
Chandler’s exposés on carbon offset projects highlight her commitment to scrutinizing environmental financing mechanisms. Investigative leads about climate fund mismanagement or corporate greenwashing in Asia-Pacific regions align with her proven track record of holding power structures accountable.
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