Dr Cathy Foley AO PSM commenced as Australia’s ninth Chief Scientist in January 2021 after an extensive career at Australia’s national science agency, the CSIRO. Dr Foley is an internationally recognised physicist with major research achievements in superconductors and sensors which lead to the development of the LANDTEM™ sensor system to locate valuable deposits of minerals deep underground, resulting in discoveries and delineation of minerals worth more than $6 billion. Dr Foley’s scientific excellence and influential leadership have been recognised with numerous awards and fellowships, including election to the Australian Academy of Science in 2020, along with an Order of Australia for service to research science and to the advancement of women in physics. She is also a Fellow of Australian Academy of Technological Science and Engineering (2008) and an honorary Fellow of Australian Institute of Physics (2019). Dr Foley is an inspiration to women in STEM across the globe and is committed to tackling gender equality and diversity in the science sector to embrace the full human potential of all.

Barry Wills has over 50 years’ experience in the minerals industry, commencing with 4 years industrial experience with Nchanga Copper Mine in Zambia and Matthey Refiners in UK. After 22 years at Camborne School of Mines as a Principal Lecturer and then head of the minerals engineering department he left in 1996 to form MEI, a family business specialising in minerals engineering conferences and dissemination of information on the minerals industry. He is author of the text book Mineral Processing Technology, now in 8th edition, and was the founder editor of Minerals Engineering journal, from which he retired in July, 2022 after 35 years as editor-in-chief. He is a recipient of the IMPC’s Distinguished Service Award and IOM3’s Medal for Excellence, and is a honorary professor of the Central South University, China.

Ms. Ingrid Oyarzún Olave has 22 years of combined experience in the mining industry. She has been working with BHP for 19 years in operational and various strategic corporate roles including Global Sustainability Innovation, Global Tailings Management, Planning and Technical Management, Studies & Project Management and Escondida Mine Operations. Ingrid’s approach of building collaborative relationships both within BHP and across the industry has enabled her to deliver global strategies in an effective and inclusive manner. Currently, she is working as Head of Sustainability Innovation as part of the Portfolio Strategy & Development, in which she is responsible for the Decarbonisation of BHP's value chain and elimination of tailings as a material risk by focusing on enablement of technology development and acceleration of the sustainability journey across BHP. Most recently, she led the development of the BHP Long Term Tailings Strategy as part of the BHP Tailings Taskforce team. In her previous assignment, she was responsible for the Minerals Americas studies portfolio as Head of Directional Studies. Ingrid also has experience in several Major Projects across all project phases - prefeasibility, feasibility and execution including as Project Engineering Manager in Escondida Water Supply -Desalination Plant ~3.000 lps - US$ 3.5 billion during its execution phase. Ingrid also has deep experience in the Escondida operation in the water and tailings managements areas and has held various senior technical and commercial project roles in her career to date.