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Travels From:
Regional Victoria
Fee Range: E
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Leader in Community Cohesion
Erfan Daliri is an author, educator, poet and social change consultant weaving together community development and professional development, performing arts, education, advocacy and academia. Born in India to Baha’i parents fleeing persecution in Iran, Erfan migrated to Australia with his parents in 1984 and watched his parents immediately commit themselves to the service of community.
Erfan’s life trajectory cannot be fully appreciated without considering the role and influence of his hero, best friend and father, the late Dr Farvardin Daliri OAM, who himself was a survivor of imprisonment and torture for being outspoken about his egalitarian beliefs. As a creative artist, a community development worker, festival director, educator and advocate for justice, equity and social cohesion, Erfan followed in his father's footsteps and does what he does because of the example his father set.
Over the course of the last 25 years Erfan has launched multiple businesses, worked across every state and territory, and initiated hundreds of projects, campaigns and events related to social cohesion, racial equity, gender equality, human rights advocacy, climate action, First Nations rights, youth empowerment, multicultural affairs, and socioeconomic justice.
A firm believer is the inextricable interconnection of everything and everyone, Erfan sees issues of social, economic and environmental injustice as completely solvable and the unnecessary outcome of disconnection and disunity. Erfan is now the founder and CEO of Kind Enterprises, a consulting firm that provides coaching, training and strategic advice to government departments, universities, corporations, peak bodies and not-for-profits across the country, helping them to create more fair, equitable and cohesive places of work and study.
As a leader in social cohesion strategy, Erfan's expertise and insights have been requested by organisations such as the Australian Human Rights Commission, the Diversity Council of Australia, Amnesty International, Red Cross, Multicultural Development Australia, Reserve Bank of England, and innumberable government departments and employers across Australia.
In 2016 Erfan used every last dollar of his personal funds, worked without pay for more than a year, sold his car and sleep in his warehouse office, and with the support of dozens of volunteers from across the world, launched Newkind Social Change Conference. Newkind is now both an annual event and an ongoing movement designed to foster activation and empowerment to create positive social impact attended by academics, advocates, students, retirees and working professionals alike. Since 2016 thousands of people have had life changing experiences at this 5-day festival style conference and the event now has a permanent base in regional Victoria where a 90-acre community farm is being built as just one of the hundreds of outcomes of the project.
Erfan has a Master’s Degree in Communication for Social Change, with a thesis on the counterproductive impacts of climate change communication, he has written three published books, released an album, and is one of Australia’s most sought after speakers on the topics of anti-racism, social cohesion and systems thinking for social change. He is also the founder and director of Newkind Social Change Conference, and founding Board Member of the Centre for Social Equity.
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