Believe it or not, Greenpeace celebrates its 40 birthday today! To mark the occasion, Kumi Naidoo, our International Executive Director, calls on us all to take inspiration from that first Greenpeace voyage, and to demand a better future for our planet:

The seeds of Greenpeace were sown 40 years ago today, when a small band of dedicated people set out to change the world, sailing from Vancouver to end US nuclear testing in the Aleutian Islands. While the first voyage failed to reach its destination, and the test went ahead, their non-violent direct action captured the public imagination, caused the cancellation of future tests and sparked a movement that grew into the world’s largest independent environmental organisation.

After four decades of putting environmental issues cent... Read more >

This month sees the Arctic sea ice minimum, a litmus test for the health of the global climate, with indications suggesting the extent in 2011 could be the lowest level ever.

Arctic sea ice acts like the planet’s air conditioning system and, like miners who used canaries to warn of deadly gases, we have the extent and volume of this ice to warn us of climate change

Summer melting is now at the highest rate since records began nearly 40 years ago and scientists are already calling the loss of Arctic sea ice "stunning…yet another wake up call that climate change is here now."

The Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise is currently in the far North, working with top climate scientists to ascertain the thickness of the shrinking ice around Svalbard. As the ice retreats, companies like Shell are... Read more >

I’ve been writing about tuna fishing in the Pacific for the last 18 months but being here and seeing it first hand is giving me a new perspective on scale.

Over the next three months the crew of the Esperanza will be campaigning in the Pacific to stop the plunder of the region’s diminishing tuna stocks. Right now there are too many fishing boats trying to catch fewer and fewer fish. In the past when I’ve written that statement I’ve imagined the Pacific being as busy as a shopping centre carpark on a Saturday afternoon. Forget that. So far it’s been more like 2am on a Sunday.

There are almost 6000 vessels licensed to fish for tuna in an area that starts from Papua New Guinea in the west and extends across to French Polynesia in the east. Now that I’m here in the middle of the vast ocean,... Read more >

We sometimes feel like we're repeating ourselves when we talk about Arctic sea ice - because we are. In recent months, sea ice extent has been again reaching record lows - right now, it's at a second-low record, just behind the 2007 record. The past five years have seen the five lowest sea ice extents recorded. If this isn't a worrying downward trend, I don't know what is.

We are causing this melt. There is just no going around it. If data and graphs and scientific research don't quite bring the point home, how about a really, really, really big piece of art?

I've talked to a lot of people about this piece of art by John Quigley - and heard just as many interpretation of what the message is.

This is what John Quigley had to say about it: "We came here to create the ‘Melting Vitruvi... Read more >

It's been ten days since we first revealed that Cottonsoft toilet paper was linked to deforestation Indonesia and it's been busy ever since.

The case against Cottonsoft is resounding, but instead of doing the right thing they've just tried to muddy the waters and hide behind mistruths. But we're not surprised. This is how Asia Pulp and Paper, and subsidiaries such as Cottonsoft, react when they get exposed. Public relations spending and greenwash have become an integral part of their business model, creating a multi-million dollar smokescreen whilst they continue to raze the natural forests of Indonesia to the ground.

For example, claiming that they are bastions of conservation and tiger protection are like me suggesting that I'm a challenge to Richie McCaw's captaincy of the All Blacks.

C... Read more >

Adidas has just announced it's goign toxic free! This is great news for our environment, our rivers and the millions of people in China and elsewhere who depend on rivers for drinking water and agriculture. Without the coming together of Greenpeace supporters and activists to challenge Nike, Adidas and other would-be champions to lead the way towards a toxic-free future, it would have taken much longer to achieve.

The world's top three sportswear brands -- Nike, Adidas and Puma -- have now committed publicly to eliminate all discharges of hazardous chemicals throughout their supply chain and across the entire lifecycle of their products by 2020. (See Adidas's statement here)

No 'safe' amount of hazardous chemicals

Importantly, Adidas's commitment to ‘zero discharge’ of hazardou... Read more >

Earlier this month, after more than 100,000 of you asked Cairn Energy to open up its Arctic oil spill response plan to public scrutiny, the government of Greenland stepped in and published it.

The verdict is now in. Veteran marine biologist and international oil spill expert Professor Richard Steiner has completed a review of the plan and, well, it's no wonder Cairn didn't want you to see it.

I'm summarising the worst of the admissions, assumptions and omissions below but you can also download Greenpeace's review and Professer Steiner's in-depth review.

Cairn makes some startling admissions in its plan. For example, the company admits that:

- Any Arctic clean up operation would grind to a halt completely in the winter months.

- The geography of Greenland’s coastline makes it imposs... Read more >