{"id":1460,"date":"2007-10-22T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2007-10-21T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/master.k8s.p4.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/press\/1460\/a-hero-for-the-environment\/"},"modified":"2021-12-01T20:40:14","modified_gmt":"2021-12-01T12:40:14","slug":"a-hero-for-the-environment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/story\/1460\/a-hero-for-the-environment\/","title":{"rendered":"A Hero for the Environment"},"content":{"rendered":"

TIME magazine recognizes Von Hernandez of Greenpeace Southeast Asia.<\/h2>\n
TIME magazine\u2019s latest issue which features the most innovative and influential protectors of the planet includes Von Hernandez, Campaigns Director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia as one of this year\u2019s Heroes of the Environment. This latest accolade is in recognition of his unrelenting campaign against waste trade and highly polluting waste incinerators in the Philippines and the region.<\/div>\n
\n

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<\/div>\n
Von Hernandez, Campaigns Director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, in a visit to Payatas garbage dump in Metro Manila. Hernandez is recognized by Time Magazine as one of this year\u2019s Heroes of the Environment in recognition of his unrelenting campaign against waste trade and highly polluting waste incinerators in the Philippines and the region.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

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\n

Von Hernandez, Campaigns Director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, in a visit to Payatas garbage dump in Metro Manila. Hernandez is recognized by Time Magazine as one of this year\u2019s Heroes of the Environment in recognition of his unrelenting campaign against waste trade and highly polluting waste incinerators in the Philippines and the region.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Hernandez started working with Greenpeace International in 1995
\nas coordinator for the environmental group\u2019s toxics campaign in
\nAsia.\u00a0 It was during this time when he launched the campaign
\nagainst the ill advised plans of setting up waste incinerators to
\ndeal with the burgeoning waste problems of Metro Manila.<\/p>\n

Hernandez\u2019s campaign exposing the economic pitfalls,
\nenvironmental and public health hazards of toxics pollution from
\nthe burning of waste, quashed these plans. That campaign culminated
\nin the passage of the Philippine
\nClean Air Act<\/a> in 1999 which included the first ever national
\nban on waste incineration. Together with allies in the Philippine
\nenvironmental movement, Hernandez subsequently and successfully
\ncampaigned for the approval of the Ecological
\nWaste Management Act<\/a> which mandates the segregation of wastes
\nand the development of materials recovery facilities and recycling
\ntargets nationwide.<\/p>\n

For this work, he was awarded the Goldman Environmental
\nPrize<\/a> in 2003 , considered to be the equivalent of the Nobel
\nprize for grassroots environmentalists.\u00a0 Hernandez is the first
\nFilipino to win the prestigious award whose previous awardees
\ninclude Nobel laureate Wangari
\nMaathai<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cIt is an honor to be recognized for one\u2019s work. More important
\nthan the personal tribute is the recognition of the urgency of the
\nenvironmental challenges now confronting our future. We cannot
\ncontinue sleepwalking our way into disaster.<\/p>\n

The waste crisis is a reminder of how our societies are
\nmindlessly undermining our life support systems, and gobbling up
\nvaluable and finite resources which ought to be shared with future
\ngenerations.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat we now have less than 100 months to reverse an impending
\nclimate catastrophe is perhaps the most stinging indictment of
\nsociety\u2019s deadly addiction to wasteful and environmentally
\ndestructive activities. This is the greatest challenge of our time,
\nand for the sake of our collective survival, we must act and strive
\nto make a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n

Von Hernandez<\/p>\n

Greenpeace Southeast Asia<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

As an environmental activist of more than fifteen years, Von has
\ninitiated a number of environmental campaigns and projects in the
\nPhilippines such as the campaign for the rehabilitation of\u00a0 the
\nPasig River, and the crusade to clean-up toxic contaminated sites
\nin the former US military bases in Clark and Subic. He is also a
\nfounder\u00a0 and key driver of various environmental initiatives and
\ncoalitions both at the national and international levels including
\nthe Global Anti-Incineration
\nAlliance (GAIA)<\/a>, Waste
\nNot Asia<\/a>,\u00a0 Lakbay
\nKalikasan<\/a>, the Eco-Waste
\ncoalition<\/a>, the Sagip Pasig
\nMovement<\/a>, and the People\u2019s Task
\nForce for Bases Clean-up<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He is now the Campaign Director of\u00a0 Greenpeace Southeast Asia
\nwhere he directly oversees the environmental group\u2019s campaigns on
\nclimate change, toxics and water pollution, forests, and
\nsustainable agriculture.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Time magazine article<\/h3>\n

Read the full article from the Time Magazine Heroes of the Environment feature<\/a><\/p>\n

Read the Greenpeace blog<\/h3>\n

Read the blog story on Greenpeace Making Waves blog<\/a><\/p>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n \t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\tDonate\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

Any kind of continued support, no matter how much, is a big help in protecting the planet we love.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t \n TAKE ACTION\n <\/a>\n \t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/section>\n\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\n\t TIME magazine’s latest issue which features the most innovative and influential protectors of the planet includes Von Hernandez, Campaigns Director of Greenpeace Southeast Asia as one of this year\u2019s Heroes of the Environment. This latest accolade is in recognition of his unrelenting campaign against waste trade and highly polluting waste incinerators in the Philippines and the region.\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":1461,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"p4_og_title":"","p4_og_description":"","p4_og_image":"","p4_og_image_id":"","p4_seo_canonical_url":"","p4_campaign_name":"","p4_local_project":"","p4_basket_name":"","p4_department":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[13,24],"p4-page-type":[16],"class_list":["post-1460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","tag-aboutus","tag-activism","p4-page-type-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1460"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1460\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11371,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1460\/revisions\/11371"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1460"},{"taxonomy":"p4-page-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/philippines\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/p4-page-type?post=1460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}