The SustainabilityX® Magazine is proud to announce the digital release of its 4th Annual Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards™ 2025, under the powerful theme "Leading with Courage." This year's awards celebrate the women who are advancing sustainability with fearless conviction, breaking barriers, dismantling inequity, and reshaping leadership in a world marked by turbulence and resistance—alongside the forthcoming debut book "Bold Women, Sustainable Futures: Leadership Lessons in an Age of Resistance" by The SustainabilityX® Magazine's founder Supriya Verma, launching March 2026 for Women's Month.
TORONTO, Oct. 2, 2025 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- The SustainabilityX® Magazine is proud to announce the digital release of its 4th Annual Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards™ 2025, under the powerful theme "Leading with Courage." This year's awards celebrate the women who are advancing sustainability with fearless conviction, breaking barriers, dismantling inequity, and reshaping leadership in a world marked by turbulence and resistance—alongside the forthcoming debut book "Bold Women, Sustainable Futures: Leadership Lessons in an Age of Resistance" by The SustainabilityX® Magazine's founder Supriya Verma, launching March 2026 for Women's Month.
Celebrating Courageous Leadership in Sustainability & Why Leading with Courage Matters Now
The 2025 edition of the The SustainabilityX® Magazine's Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards™ recognizes 50 extraordinary women whose work is shifting paradigms, driving systemic transformation, and closing the gender gap in sustainability leadership. These awardees come from diverse sectors—policy, business, science, activism, and the arts—yet they share a common spirit: the courage to lead in times of uncertainty and resistance.
From spearheading renewable energy solutions and climate finance strategies to championing frontline communities and reshaping governance, this year's honourees exemplify what it means to lead with courage in the face of mounting climate, social, and economic crises.
This year's theme, "Leading with Courage," honours the resilience, strength, and vision of women who continue to drive sustainability forward—even amid uncertainty and resistance.
In 2025, the stakes for sustainability have never been higher. Geopolitical conflicts, economic instability, and increasing hostility toward climate action threaten to roll back hard-won progress. Yet, women are stepping up—crafting bold policies, building resilient economies, and ensuring sustainability remains at the heart of decision-making.
Women bring collaborative, solution-driven leadership that is critical in these uncertain times. Their contributions extend beyond boardrooms and government offices to grassroots movements, corporate strategies, technological innovations, and global policymaking. This year, we celebrate women who are not just weathering the storm but reshaping the world for the better.
"Courage is not just about standing firm—it's about standing forward," says Supriya Verma, founder of The SustainabilityX® Magazine. "Women in sustainability today are not merely holding the line; they are pushing it forward, reshaping industries, economies, and societies. The future of sustainability depends on those who lead not in comfort, but in crisis—with unwavering conviction, innovation, and purpose."
Key Highlights of the 2025 Awards
- 40 Contemporary Leaders Honoured: The awards recognize 40 women who have demonstrated exceptional leadership in sustainability, driving transformative change in their respective fields. These leaders are celebrated for their courageous approaches to advancing climate action, social justice, and sustainable innovation despite economic, political, or social barriers. Their work not only addresses urgent environmental and equity challenges but also sets a powerful example for future generations of leaders.
- 10 Historic Icons Celebrated: The Historic Icons section pays tribute to 10 extraordinary women—scientists, activists, artists, Indigenous leaders, cultural visionaries, and political trailblazers—whose legacies continue to shape the present and inspire the future. Long before sustainability became a global mandate, they broke barriers, challenged injustice, and redefined what leadership could mean in their time. From pioneering environmental science and defending human rights to leading nations and sparking global movements, their enduring impact carved pathways for today's Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards™ 2025 and remains a beacon of courage, resilience, and vision for a more just and sustainable world.
We are honoured to spotlight these 50 trailblazers who are not only shaping a greener and more inclusive future but are also leading with courage in the face of resistance—driving solutions that advance climate action, equity, and justice even in turbulent times. Their achievements remind us that courageous leadership is the foundation of sustainability, and they inspire us all to act boldly, amplify their efforts, and keep the dialogue alive.
Thank you to our sponsors for making these awards possible:
- Core Sponsor: Belnor Engineering Inc.
- Gift Sponsors: NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business, Competent Boards, Blinkist, Skillshare, Women Get On Board, Packed With Purpose, Teachable, and GetSmarter
- Promotional Partners: Toronto Climate Week, Tough Old Broads, Cision, IWBI Social Sustainability Summit, and the Sustainable Journalism Partnership
New Debut Book "Bold Women, Sustainable Futures" by SustainabilityX® Founder to Launch March 2026 for Women's Month
Aligned with this year's theme, The SustainabilityX® Magazine is proud to highlight the forthcoming debut book from its founder, Supriya Verma: "Bold Women, Sustainable Futures: Leadership Lessons in an Age of Resistance" (launching March 2026 for Women's Month) featuring past and present awardees of The SustainabilityX® Magazine's Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards™ program.
With women around the world bearing the brunt of the climate crisis coupled with DEI/ESG policy rollbacks and the revival of cultural misogyny, "Bold Women, Sustainable Futures" is a moving and timely book about the progress, potential, and power of women in sustainability leadership to bring about impactful and inclusive systemic change. After laying out how sustainability and sustainable development is best supported by leadership rooted in collective progress, justice, and inclusion, the book profiles nine bold women leading across climate science, governance, business, media, advocacy, and the arts—while also weaving in Verma's own journey as a woman of colour navigating leadership, voice, and healing.
The second half of the book takes a hard look at the current backlash against DEI and ESG initiatives, providing meaningful context for the crisis and asking: In this age of resistance, what do we do now? How do we move forward in a world moving backwards? What do young women starting their leadership journeys do? What do existing senior female leaders caught up in the backlash do?
In response, Verma offers strategies and solutions, including concrete steps and action plans for meeting this moment head-on.
The book also includes a powerful fulcrum chapter, "The Turning Point—The Tide Is Going Out," featuring even more reflections from extraordinary women across sustainability, business, and justice movements. Together, their voices offer wisdom and guidance on leading with courage when the systems we thought were shifting are turning back.
Amidst a growing backlash against climate action, gender equity, anti-racism, human rights, ESG, and DEI, "Bold Women, Sustainable Futures: Leadership Lessons in an Age of Resistance" has become:
- A mirror, held up to a world that wants to forget how far we still have to go.
- A manual, for how to lead not only when praised, but when punished.
- A call to action, grounded in the lived realities of those who refuse to be erased.
Beautifully written and grounded in both research and lived experience, "Bold Women, Sustainable Futures" serves as a guide for:
- Existing women in leadership navigating the backlash head-on,
- Aspiring women leaders and emerging voices looking to step up, and
- Students searching for role models as they enter the field.
"The awards program and the book are two parts of the same mission — to celebrate women whose leadership is reshaping not just sustainability, but the very meaning of courage, all while navigating systems that were never designed for women to thrive, especially now in an age of resistance," said Verma.
Readers can join the book's launch list to receive updates, sneak peeks, and exclusive excerpts.
Digital Release and Engagement Opportunities
The SustainabilityX® Magazine's Global 50 Women In Sustainability Awards™ 2025 are unveiled digitally on SustainabilityX.Co. This digital-first release ensures that the Awards transcend time zones and borders, with content reaching readers around the world in an asynchronous fashion.
Highlights include:
- Main Awards Page – a comprehensive showcase of this year's 50 honourees and their courageous contributions, including individual highlights exploring each leader's journey, impact, and vision.
- Thought Leadership Articles – contributions by awardees offering insights into the pressing sustainability issues of our time.
Content Sponsorship Opportunities
Organizations aligned with sustainability and women's leadership are invited to partner with The SustainabilityX® Magazine through content and awards sponsorships. Packages offer global visibility, alignment with a powerful mission, and association with a community of distinguished global leaders. For more details, please email [email protected].
About The SustainabilityX® Magazine
The SustainabilityX® Magazine is an award-winning, digital, female-founded, and female-led non-profit initiative bringing the environment and economy together for a sustainable future through dialogue, and now transforming the environment and economy for a sustainable future through the power of women's leadership. Founded on May 8, 2016, and inspired by the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals by Canada's Top 30 Under 30 in Sustainability Leadership awardee, Supriya Verma, the digital media initiative focuses on approaching the world's most pressing challenges with a holistic, integrated, systems-based perspective as opposed to the traditional and ineffective siloed approach with a single lens on interdisciplinary topics like climate and energy. This initiative ultimately seeks to explore how to effectively bring the environment and economy together through intellectual, insightful dialogue and thought-provoking discussion amongst individuals across sectors taking an interdisciplinary and integrated approach to untangling the intricate web of sustainability while championing women's leadership in sustainability.
The SustainabilityX® Magazine is built upon the four foundational pillars of sustainability: Environmental Stewardship, which emphasizes the importance of improving environmental health; Economic Prosperity, which promotes sustainable economic growth that transcends traditional capitalist models; Social Inclusion, which focuses on equity, diversity, and inclusion (DEI) for BIPOC, LGBTQ, and other marginalized or vulnerable communities; and Just Governance, which highlights responsible leadership, the equal application of the rule of law, and the creation of fair systems for all.
As we continue our mission to align with the Women's Empowerment Principles (WEPs), we continue to explore the diverse and interconnected factors that influence sustainability. By recognizing how these elements interact across local, national, and international levels, we aim to accelerate progress toward sustainability goals. In essence, this aligns with The SustainabilityX® Magazine's vision of integrating environmental and economic progress for a more just, inclusive, and sustainable future through thoughtful dialogue.
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