Supporter of the week: Pete Wilkinson

Hannah Booth

12 January 2012

To celebrate Friends of the Earth's 40th anniversary, I talked to some of the supporters who've made it all possible. Pete Wilkinson (right) has been in it from the start - persuading us to be kind to the planet.

"I walked into a borrowed room in King Street, Covent Garden in 1971. This is where Friends of the Earth's first meetings were held. I was immediately set to work collecting empty bottles from pubs nearby.

"This was for our first big campaign, dumping 2,000 non-returnable bottles outside Schweppes' London HQ to try to persuade supermarkets to switch [to returnable bottles].

"Glass bottles still aren't re-used in this country. It's such a waste. Re-use should be the first step in the chain, before recycling. The action did raise our profile.

"The most memorable campaign I was involved in was our early work against commercial whaling. This was before Greenpeace. We towed an inflatable whale down the Thames.

It actually ripped and sank, but we got more media coverage than if it had stayed afloat.

Next week: Stanley Knill. To see all the supporters I interviewed, visit our 40th anniversary gallery.

Hannah Booth also writes Lives Less Ordinary.