Professor Christian (Andi) Nygaard

Professor Christian (Andi) Nygaard is an applied housing and social economist. He joins UNSW and City Futures Research Centre having previously held academic and research positions at Swinburne University of Technology, where he was the director of the Centre for Urban Transitions and the Swinburne-AHURI Research Centre Director, the University of Reading, RMIT University and University of Glasgow. 

Andi's primary research interests are in housing economics, urban transitions, institutional innovation, and policy / impact identification and evaluation. His housing economics research includes macroeconomics of housing affordability and housing market impact of housing supply / supply driven urban renewal. His urban transitions research includes long-term socio-spatial dynamics, the geological foundations of cities and urban dynamics, and sustainability transitions (decarbonising cities). His institutional research includes governance adaption and innovation for affordable housing provision, transitioning to circular economies and industrial policy making in resource rich countries. He has undertaken several policy evaluations of homelessness support programs, decarbonisation of freight, and identification of social value in housing and environmental design. These research areas are connected by economic processes and social behaviours, such as housing markets and policy; persistence and path dependence; property rights and institutions; and, spatial social structures and social interactions, that inhibit and enable change.

Andi works closely with key housing and urban actors and decision-makers in Australia and internationally to device actionable insight and policy for housing strategy development and sustainability transitions. This includes development of SIGMAH (Social Infrastructure and Green Measures for Affordable Housing) – a tool designed to estimate wider social, economic and environmental benefits arising from provision of social and affordable housing, environmental design standards such as energy efficient housing and inclusion of green space/landscaping.

Outside academia he is a co-Managing Editor for Housing Studies, the leading forum for theoretical and analytical developments in the field of housing research. Previous professional and community roles include trustee (2014-2017) and Chair or Trustees (2016-2017) for the Reading Refugee Support Group (UK); Committee member of the Royal Statistical Society’s 'Official Statistics Section' and 'Discussion Meeting Committee', founding member of the Social Value Collective (Australia), and the Circular Economy Research Network Asia-Pacific.