R. Neil Sampson

R. Neil Sampson grew up on a farm in Northern Idaho and has spent his career in natural resource conservation with service in the Soil Conservation Service (now Natural Resources Conservation Service), the National Association of Conservation Districts, and the American Forestry Association (now American Forests). As President of the Sampson Group, Inc., a natural resources consulting firm in Alexandria, Virginia, he also serves as adjunct professor at Virginia Tech’s Northern Virginia Campus, teaching public policy as it relates to private land conservation programs. In 2001, he was the F.K. Weyerhaeuser Visiting Fellow at the Yale School, involved in research and teaching on public policy as it relates to private forest management and sustainable forestry.

He has written many popular and professional articles on a broad range of natural resource topics, focusing on soil and water conservation, forest management and health, climate change, and public policy. His first book, Farmland or Wasteland, won the Natural Resource Council of America's Book of the Year Award in 1984. He has been a lead author for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the Millenium Ecosystem Assessment.