Helen Hannah Rigg Hughes (née Rigg; 29 August 1929 – 23 November 2024) was a New Zealand botanist. She served as New Zealand's first Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, from 1987 to 1996.
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Background
Hughes was born Helen Hannah Rigg in Nelson on 29 August 1929, the daughter of agricultural scientist Theodore Rigg, who became director of the Cawthron Institute in 1933, and Esther Rigg (née White). She grew up in the suburb of Tāhunanui, and was educated at Nelson College for Girls, where she discovered her passion for botany. Rigg went on to complete a Master of Science degree with first-class honours in botany at Canterbury University College, graduating in 1952. Her thesis was titled An ecological survey of the pakihi lands of the Westport District, Nelson. She was awarded a Fulbright grant to travel to the United States, and studied at Vassar College from 1952 to 1954, earning a Master of Science degree.
Rigg married David Crowther Hughes in 1955, and the couple had four children. She died at her home in the Wellington suburb of Seatoun, on 23 November 2024, at the age of 95.
Career
After returning to New Zealand from the United States, Helen Hughes taught at secondary schools in Christchurch and later Wellington. In 2017, she recalled that jobs for women in science at the time were hard to come by and there was "a bit of an old boys network operating".