John Sauven

Biography

John Sauven is executive director of Greenpeace UK and took over the top post at the campaign group from Steven Tindale, a former adviser to Labour Ministers on green issues.

Starting working for Greenpeace in the early 1990s, Sauven was involved in the campaigns to ban underground nuclear testing in the Pacific and campaigns against Trident in the UK. He has also been involved in campaigns to protect the temperate rainforests on the west coast of Canada and to halt deforestation in the Amazon, Congo and Indonesia.

Special areas of interest

* One of the key areas of his work has been with business. Sauven helped develop Greenpeace's "Greenfreeze" campaign (greenfreeze technology is now a global refrigeration industry standard) to protect the ozone layer disappearing because of our use of CFCs and other ozone layer destroying chemicals.
* He also helped to promote the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) as part of Greenpeace's forest campaign so companies and consumers could buy legal and sustainable timber and paper.
* Recently, he led the global campaign to stop the expansion of soya in the Amazon rainforest, leading to a historic victory when a moratorium was agreed on further deforestation by the large multinational corporations like Cargill.

Sauven believes Greenpeace's ongoing work on solutions with companies may win fewer headlines, but the effort to evolve new, more sustainable business models is where the future will be won or lost. This is particularly the case with climate change where cleaner, more efficient products, processes and ways of producing energy need to be brought to market by government regulation and company innovation.

He has made several award winning films with the film director Julian Temple and film producer Eski Thomas.

Sources

* John Sauven profile [http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/johnsauven]
* Stephen Sackur talks to John Sauven of Greenpeace about climate change. Is carbon capture the way forward or is it just "greenwash"? [http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=kQiBugvqgY8]
* This broad-ranging interview with John Sauven, executive director of Greenpeace UK, discusses the political commitment surrounding global warming, the incoming Climate Change Bill and, more tangibly, and asks what consumers should be doing to adapt their lifestyles. [http://www.carbon-free.tv/cgi-bin/details.pl?action=pre&id=436]
* John Sauven explains why tuna, once the 'chicken of the sea', is now at grave risk from overfishing. [http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/tags/john-sauven]
* Zac Goldsmith (The Ecologist), Jeremy Leggett, John Sauven, Adam Boulton [http://www.hayfestival.com/archive/download.aspx?fileid=238]
* Speech by John Sauven at the launch of the Conservative Party's 'Power to the People' policy document [http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/node/4696]
* Interview between the late Anita Roddick and John Sauven on the power of NGOs [http://www.open2.net/society/politics_law/peoplepower.html]