Speakers

Will is co-Executive Director of Greenpeace UK. Prior to this, as Head of Oceans at Greenpeace UK from 2015-22 Will led campaigns on sustainable fisheries, including working alongside low impact fishing communities; he founded and led their international 30x30 campaign geared to create ocean sanctuaries in international and national waters. Before that, he oversaw the launch of their first campaigns on plastic, helping reshape the global conversation about plastic waste away from litter to being one about reducing production, including authoring a book, How to Give Up Plastic, published by Penguin in 2018 and since translated into 12 languages.

Becki is a Nature Makers Art Activity Provider and Artist Educator working predominantly in the West Midlands. She delivers eco-friendly, mindful nature art, craft and outdoor play workshops and events focussed on sustainability and plastic-free creativity.

Nature Makers website

As Sustainability Support Officer for Bournemouth University, Izzy supports the implementation of initiatives to embed sustainability at Bournemouth University, with a focus on waste, biodiversity, food, travel, and education for sustainable development. 

Izzy is also responsible for engaging students, staff and local community with sustainability through awareness campaigns, training, and events.

Dale is the founder of POSY London, the plastic-free natural deodorant brand on a mission to banish BO and single-use plastic — one armpit at a time.

Fed up with greenwashing and products that promised “natural” but delivered meh results, Dale rolled up her sleeves (and tested a lot of deodorant) to create something better: planet-kind, skin-loving, and actually effective. Posy was born to prove that smelling amazing doesn’t have to cost the Earth. She’s here to share the behind-the-scenes of building a business that’s as bold as it is kind — to pits and the planet.

POSY website

Cllr Janne Jarvis - West Suffolk Council

Janne Jarvis is the District Councillor for Newmarket North – West Suffolk. 

A proud Anglo-Finn, Janne is an advocate for sustainability and has spearheaded the first council-led reverse vending machine scheme in the UK, in West Suffolk and Cambridge.

Read more about Janne's efforts here

Alec Young - Eryri National Park

Alec is the Carbon Officer for the Eryri National Park Authority and led the Plastic-Free Yr Wyddfa project in 2022-24.  The pilot project runs a successful sustainability scheme for businesses, a series of innovative comms campaigns, improved refill infrastructure in the area and trialled behaviour change experiments in partnership with Bangor University. The project continues to engage with the public at wide and aims to achieve a plastic-free status for Wales' highest mountain in the future.

Read more about Plastic Free Yr Wyddfa

Isabel Mack - Party Kit Network

Isabel is the founder of the Party Kit Network, a global community helping more people ditch disposable tableware through shared kits of reusables. With nearly 600 members across the UK, Australia and beyond, the network has helped avoid over 1 million single-use items through local action and community sharing.

Party Kit Network website

Natalie Fee - City to Sea

Natalie is an award-winning environmentalist, author, inspirational speaker and founder of City to Sea, a not-for-profit organisation running campaigns to stop plastic pollution.

In 2019 Natalie won the Sunday Times Volvo Visionaries Award for her campaign work, and in 2018 she was listed as one of the UK’s ‘50 New Radicals’ by The Observer / Nesta. In the same year the University of the West of England awarded her the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Science in recognition of her services to the environment 

She won the Sheila McKechnie Award for Environmental Justice in 2017 for City to Sea's #SwitchtheStick campaign and is proud to have been named Bristol 24/7’s Woman of the Year for 2018. 

City to Sea website

Miriam Adcock - Zero Waste Scotland

Miriam has worked at Zero Waste Scotland for 15 years as part of the communications team.  She’s worked on campaigns from Home Composting, to Love Food Hate Waste, to Trial Period (reusable menstrual products), to Ditching Disposables (single-use items used in the hospitality industry) and much more.  She has supported numerous community groups in their quest to reduce waste – giving talks and offering advice.  Recently her focus has been on cups – working with partners to reduce the number of Single-use cups and increase the use of reusables.

Zero Waste Scotland website

Helen Tandy - Eco Communities

By day, Helen is a Partner and Ethical Financial Adviser at Castlefield, where she helps individuals and organisations align their finances with their values. She has been fortunate to reduce her paid working hours to dedicate more time to her not-for-profit work with Eco Communities, where she serves as Director. 

Helen supports regions in Cheshire to become Plastic Free Communities, working in partnership with Surfers Against Sewage, for whom she acts as the Chester Community Representative. She also represents Chester as the Refill Rep for City to Sea, helping to reduce reliance on single-use plastic through initiatives like their returnable coffee cup scheme across parts of Cheshire. 

Helen is passionate about reducing single-use plastic and litter, and she enjoys engaging with others on topics including sustainable living, responsible business practices, and achieving net zero.

Eco Communities website

Emma has over 10 years experience in the marine mammal rescue field, and have seen the devastating impacts of pollution on our marine life in Cornwall. It led her to be passionate about reducing our reliance on single-use plastics, so she was thrilled to join Surfers Against Sewage as Communities Officer for Plastic Free Communities in Jan 2023. Emma supports a network of volunteers in the UK, all working to tackle avoidable single-use plastics in their own communities. She loves spending time with her family and crazy spaniel around the Cornish coast, and never passes off a chance to jump in the sea!

Surfers Against Sewage website

Steve is a specialist in addressing plastic pollution and advancing ocean conservation. As Director of the Revolution Plastics Institute at the University of Portsmouth, he leads a team of over 120 researchers to develop transdisciplinary and inclusive solutions for the global plastics crisis. Their work focuses on innovative approaches across the plastics value chain, fostering sustainable and equitable transitions to a circular plastics economy. 

In addition to this role, Steve serves as the NERC Agenda Setting Fellow for Plastic Pollution, shaping the UK’s research and innovation framework to address this critical global challenge. He is a member of the UNEP International Resource Panel and Editor-in-Chief of the journal 'Plastics'.  

With a proven track record of leading large, multi-partner projects, Steve combines academic rigour with actionable insights to drive solutions that benefit people and nature.

Revolution Plastics Institute website