hugging trees and saving whales

Ask Japan to arrest you!

2008-11-13T09:33:00.003Z

The whaling industry in Japan is changing. There is no longer a demand for whale-meat, they can't get enough people to crew their ships and their own media are starting, slowly, to question why tax-payers are propping up this redundant industry in the light of international opposition.

Meanwhile the Japanese gov't is being condemed by Amnesty and the UN for arresting two japanese whaling protesters who uncovered a scandle of stolen whale-meat.

Greenpeace are asking everyone who opposes whaling to ask the Japanese Gov't to arrest them too - as this is all the two Japanese activists are guilty of.

Take Action!

Sign the petition to send a message that the world is watching Japan!

do you know how green your gizmos are?

2008-10-22T16:43:00.004+01:00

greenpeace have compiled a green chart of electronics companies, after following a tonne of e-waste to a dump in Pakistan.

Surprisingly Apple are near the bottom, and Nokia, so far, come out nearest the green end! Microsoft are near the very bottom, no surprises there though.

Go check out the chart and buy wisely this xmas ;o)

Japan arrests the whistle-blowers not the bad guys

2008-06-24T11:17:00.002+01:00

Japan's international reputation is taking another beating over whaling.
After Greenpeace gave a dossier of evidence to the Tokyo prosucuters office, which revealed that the 'sciencfic' whaling meat products were being given away to staff rather than sold through regulated channels, the prosecuter has decided not to pursue the corrupt officals, and arrested the two Greenpeace activists instead for 'stealing' the whale-meat that they gave in as part of their evidence.

This is totally ridiculous, and as this years IWC starts in Chile (the big international talking-shop of the International Whaling Commision) Japan needs to realise that this act just shows that they are unable to stand-up to the deep running corruption and power of the whaling industry, and is making them look foolish in the eyes of the world.

Take action!

Email the Japanese Forign Minister to ask for the release of the activists and the resumption of the investigation into the whale-meat corruption. Greenpeace have kindly written a letter for you if you're short of time!

Tell Dove to clean up their act!

2008-05-07T13:50:00.003+01:00

Dove soap - nice products, nice brand, nice 'real beauty' marketing.... not very nice products.

Dove, owned by Unilever, use palm oil in their products. Palm oil that comes from destroyed areas of rainforest in Indonesia, home to the Orangutan and lots of other endemic and endangered species.

Greenpeace are asking anyone who uses Dove products to send a message to the makers, Unilever, asking if they will stop using palm oil to help halt the destruction of the rainforests.

take action!

Send this letter to the Unilever executives, its better to personalise it if you have time.

Get europe to reduce, re-use and recycle more

2008-04-29T12:29:00.003+01:00

I've been involved in lots of emails and petitions to my local MPs, Ministers and the Prime Minister here in the UK, but not many to MEPs at the European Parliment or indeed anything to do with European law.

Increasingly, EU laws are important in getting all European countries to sign up to environmental targets or policies, which even if they are not as tough as some of us would like, at least they are getting lots of countries involved.

There is a law going through readings at the EU to make all EU countries sign up to targets for recycling and waste reduction.

Take action!

Email your Minister using this Friends of the Earth form

We don't need M+S plastic bags

2008-04-07T13:51:00.002+01:00

I've been seeing a lot more people with big, strong, re-usable bags heading off to do their shopping recently. Helped by most of the supermarkets now doing 'bag for life' or even better, nice strong canvas bags, some people are now doing the first two of the 'reduce, reuse, recycle' mantra, and not just recycling their plastic bags only to grab another one the next shop.

M+S have apparently said that if there is enough public support, they will stop giving away free plastic bags. If one of the big stores makes this move, lots more will follow in a 'we're just as green as they are' PR stunt.

So, we just need to convince M+S that we don't need their free plastic bags to carry our undies home in, which will then sit in a land-fil for decades.

take action!

Sign this petition

Help protect the morray firth dolphin sanctuary

2008-02-22T18:42:00.002Z

I've recently been thinking about holidays, and where I could go to combine the usual requirements of nice food, stunning scenery and some peace and quite, with some whale watching. When you start searching around for the world's best whale and dolphin watching spots, its amazing how many species can be seen around the UK.

I've been lucky enough to see minke whales off the coast of the Isle of Mull, and although I've not seen them myself, I know that the resident bottlenose dolphins in the Morray Firth are a huge tourist hit - our very own scottish flippers!

In fact, the bottlenose dolphins are so special that most of their home was created as a Special Area of Conservation in 2005. Brilliant! Dolphins right here in the UK, and they're protected.

.... or at least they should be.
But the government is currently seriously considering allowing new gas and oil exploration, in the Morray Firth, where our dolphins live. What's the point of protecting an area, and then just ramroading that protection by going ahead with new industry developments without properly assessing the impact on the animals that are meant to be protected? Under EU law they should have done this assesement, but they haven't.

take action!

Sign the WDCS petition to keep the oil and gas out of the dolphin's home
Wto your MP to get them to put your views to the Gov'ts consultation

Scotland leading the way tackling climate change

2008-02-15T13:49:00.004Z

WWF Passport have a new campaign, telling the Scottish parliament what a good job they've done with their new climate change bill, that hopefully will get passed later this year.
Its a far more ambitious bill than in England, with yearly % reduction targets for emissions, and an 80% reduction by 2050 - the kind of targets needed to really address climate change.

take action!

Use WWF passport to email the Scottish Parliament, to keep the bill strong and get it passed.

Thank Australia for taking on the Japanese whalers

2008-02-08T16:12:00.000Z

You might have seen the recent news coverage showing footage of Japanese whalers slaughtering a mother and calf minke whale. The fottage was released by the Australian government who have taken a brave step speaking out against Japan, which could cause diplomatic problems for them. They are even planning to launch a court case against Japan.

I thought that the bald and bold minister I saw on the TV deserved a thank you - everyone likes some encouragement right? So I emailed him to say thanks. You can too.

take action!

Email Peter Garrett to say thankyou.

new coal power stations? er, public enquiry please!

2008-02-04T21:02:00.001Z

Quick post, i'm on timed internet access with about 10 mintues left!

ALthough the Gov't keeps assuring us that the UKs energy bill will see us hit the EUs renewable energy targets, and our Kyoto c02 level reductions, for some reason planning permission has just been passed for a huge coal power station in Kent. This shouldn't be upto a local council to decide, this is national energy policy.

Greenpeace have a email you can send off to John Hutton, asking for a public enquiry on new coal power stations. They also have some interesting background on e-On sticking thier oar in.

Take action!

Email John Hutton to ask for a public enquiry.

no free range chicken at Asda - here's proof!

2008-02-01T13:51:00.000Z

Here's my picture to prove there is no free-range chicken available at my local Asda store.

I've emailed it to Hugh's Chicken Out campaign, and I'm also going to email it with a polite reply to the lady who emailed me from Asda customer services, assuring me that my store does stock free-range chickens. They may well do, but never when I'm in the store.

Chicken out! take action with a supermakert snap

2008-01-31T14:08:00.000Z

The lastest idea from the ChickenOut campaign, is to collect a nationwide snapshop of the effect the campaign is having on supermarket shelves. Hugh FW is asking us to take a piccie of the free-range shelf in our local supermarket, to show that demand is currently outweighing supply.

Funnily enough, just yesterday I sent an email to Asda, asking why my local store didn't have any whole free-range chickens for sale, only 2 packs of free-range organic legs (1 less after my visit). they replied to say that the store manager had confirmed that free-range chickens were available - well not when I visit they're not!

So, tomorrow I will take my camera phone with me, and then email the evidence of the empty shelves to Hugh's collection.

Take Action!

Grab your phone, take a snap, then email it to campaign@chickenout.tv

Webchat with a minister

2008-01-29T13:41:00.000Z

I've just been watching a live webchat with John Hutton - Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform.
I had an email this morning from Greenpeace UK, with a link to the webchat and a few example questions to put to the minister about the governments energy policy; nuclear power and waste, new coal power stations and renewable targets being the main subjects.

I did submit a question, in my own words, about meeting the new EU renewable energy production targets. It didn't get onto the webchat, but there were clearly lots of other greenpeace people who did, as I recognised some of the questions!

Will this make the minister change his policies overnight - almost certainly not. But just like signing a petition, its another way of directly showing a minister public opinion on the issues. If he has seen all the questions that have come in from UK voters, and a large number are in support of more renewables, somewhere in his subconscience might be a small memory that renewables = vote winners. That's the hope anyway.

Worlds largest tree

2008-01-28T10:34:00.000Z

I was watching the first episode of Monty Don's new BBC series, Around the world in 80 gardens, where he visited Mexico and Cuba. In Oaxaca in Mexico, he visited the worlds widest tree, thought to be around 1,500 years old, it was growing at the time the Inca civilizations were still going strong.

In the UK, we have possibly more ancient trees than anywhere else in Europe, mainly thanks to William the Conqueror who set up protected areas so the Royals would be sure of good hunting grounds. The Woodland Trust is currently trying to map where all our ancient trees are, and get them protected.

Take Action!

Donate to the Ancient Tree Hunt campaign
Find out more and help map where the trees are

Climate change bill - email your MP!

2008-01-25T16:05:00.000Z

Friends of the Earth have been running 'The Big Ask' since 2005, trying to get UK MPs to make the government take action on climate change.

We now have a climate change bill going through parliment, but it needs support to make it tough enough to be effective. You can email your MP using the form and letter provider, and ask them to sign an Early Day Motion that's asking for really tough measures in the Bill.

Take Action!

Email your MP to suppor the early day motion (take less than 1 minute)

Shoot whales with a Canon, not a harpoon

2008-01-24T12:06:00.000Z

Greenpeace are hot on the trail of the Japanese whaling fleet, and have successfully blocked them for 13 days from their 'scientific whaling'. But they're now cleverly targeting Japanese businesses, hoping to show them that their governments support for killing whales in what is meant to be a protected area - the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary - is damaging the whole countries reputation abroad.

Canon are world leaders in cameras, printers and other electonics, and as a brand they align themselves with an image of protecting the environment and endanagered species - they've advertised in National Geographic since 1981. So, the idea is to email the CEO of Canon, Mister Mitarai, who is also currently head of the Japanese Business Federation, and ask him to sign a statement supporting only non-lethal whale research.

There is a template email that you can just add your name and email address to, or you can edit it to make it more personal.

take action!

Email Mister Mitarai to defend the whales
Donate to Greenpeace to help them save whales