Dori Patay

Dr. Dori Patay is a Research Fellow at the Leeder Centre for Health Policy and Economy within the Sydney School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine and Health at the University of Sydney. She holds additional affiliations with the Sydney Centre for Healthy Societies, Sydney Environment Institute, and Sydney Southeast Asia Centre.

Her research focuses on multisectoral governance for complex public health challenges, particularly examining intersections between health, trade, agriculture, and environmental policy. Key areas include food systems governance, commercial determinants of health, and international investment agreements. She employs transdisciplinary approaches combining political science, regulation studies, and development frameworks to address issues in Pacific Island contexts.

Her recent publications reveal strong thematic concentration in food systems transformation (63% of 2023-2025 articles) and tobacco governance (27%), with emerging work on computational treaty analysis. The research portfolio demonstrates consistent Pacific regional focus (41% of publications) and methodological emphasis on qualitative governance analysis (78%).

Key awards and grants:

• National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Ideas Grant: Safeguarding health in International Investment Agreements
• NHMRC Partnerships project: Strengthening policy for healthy and sustainable diets
• Sydney Southeast Asia Centre Incubator Program (2024)
• Charles Perkins Centre Seed Funding (2024)

Dr. Patay advises research students Kamara Pather (digital marketing restrictions for food systems) and Takwa Tissaoui (trade agreements for planetary health equity). She collaborates with multidisciplinary teams across ANU, University of Queensland, and The George Institute for Global Health, with current projects examining food systems governance and international investment agreements.

Her institutional engagement includes membership in the Australian Fair Trade and Investment Network (2021-present), Public Health Association of Australia (2019-present), and Australian Research Centre for Health Equity (2017-present), reflecting sustained commitment to health equity and policy coherence.