Julia Hailes MBE

Sustainability Pioneer

Shameful BBC Totally Ignores Nature March – jun24

What possible reason could there be for the BBC totally ignoring up to 100,000 nature protestors yesterday? The ‘Restore Nature Now’ march, organized by Extinction Rebellion (XR) and numerous wildlife and conservation bodies, doesn’t even feature in the BBC search engine today. I know it happened because I was there. Thankfully, it did get some […]

Cop26 The Time to Act is Now (Nov21)

Al Gore was forthright. He said that at the Paris COP in 2015, the key challenge was denial. In Glasgow, the message is clear – it’s delay.  The exciting thing about joining the marches with Greta was the feeling of being one of many who recognised the dire predicament the world is facing.  There were […]

Eco-anxiety is disempowering (Oct21)

Schools should do more a lot more to prevent eco-anxiety from becoming the biggest mental health issue of our time. Over 70% of 18-24 year-olds feel eco-anxiety, according to research carried out by Force of Nature – an NGO founded in 2019 by 19-year-old climate activist, Clover Hogan. Talking to children around the world, the […]

Was I a green yuppy? (Aug21)

Thirty two years ago – September 1989 – the Telegraph feature title was ‘Saving the Earth…. and Making money’. I was described as a ‘green yuppy’ or ‘guppy’, who sold out to industrialists. I was keener on the term ‘green realo’ and was quoted as saying ‘The fundies believe in a few people doing a […]

My Green Life (May21)

When I was a baby my brother painted me green.. Perhaps a sign of what was to come. And the start of my Zoom speech on ‘My Green Life’. I also talk about: Setting up SustainAbility Ltd, with John Elkington, in 1987 The global success of ‘The Green Consumer Guide’, published in 1988 Becoming a […]

TV Clips compilation of Julia Hailes talking about waste and packaging – 1988-1990.

Recycling was probably the most popular green consumer issue because people could really understand what they could do. Quite often it was the only environmental thing they were prepared to do! Here I’m talking about recycled loo paper, overloaded landfill sites, saving energy, recycled materials, Mcdonalds cartons, egg boxes etc… “As we fill more and […]

Legendary Environmental Activist! (Jan12)

As part of their ‘Remarkable Men and Women’ series, I was invited to speak to Laurel Springs online school.  In the introduction I could see which parts of the world the children came from – mostly America but several in the Far East too.  I was the only participant from the UK.   My brief was […]

Green Alliance: can politicians save us? (Jul07)

Giles Chitty and Julia Hailes at Green Alliance Debate Jul07 Matthew Taylor, the Chief Executive of The Royal Society of Arts (RSA) whispered in my ear that he didn’t suppose I would make any jokes in my presentation because women don’t make jokes! He looked a bit surprised when I said that I was starting […]