Greenpeace exists because this fragile earth deserves a voice. It needs solutions. It needs change. It needs action.

Greenpeace is an independent global campaigning organisation that acts to change attitudes and behaviour, to protect and conserve the environment and to promote peace by:

Catalysing an energy revolution to address the number one threat facing our planet: climate change.

Defending our oceans by challenging wasteful and destructive fishing, and creating a global network of marine reserves.

Protecting the world's ancient forests and the animals, plants and people that depend on them.

Working for disarmament and peace by tackling the causes of conflict and calling for the elimination of all nuclear weapons.

Creating a toxic free future with safer alternatives to hazardous chemicals in today's products and manufacturing.

Campaining for sustainable agriculture by rejecting genetically engineered organisms, protecting biodiversity and encouraging socially responsible farming.

Greenpeace is present in 40 countries across Europe, the Americas, Asia and the Pacific.

To maintain its independence, Greenpeace does not accept donations from governments or corporations but relies on contributions from individual supporters and foundation grants.

Greenpeace has been campaigning against environmental degradation since 1971 when a small boat of volunteers and journalists sailed into Amchitka, an area north of Alaska where the US Government was conducting underground nuclear tests. This tradition of 'bearing witness' in a non-violent manner continues today, and our ships are an important part of all our campaign work.

We exist to expose environmental criminals, and to challenge government and corporations when they fail to live up to their mandate to safeguard our environment and our future.

In pursuing our mission, we have no permanent allies or enemies. We promote open, informed debate about society's environmental choices. We use research, lobbying, and quiet diplomacy to pursue our goals, as well as high-profile, non-violent conflict to raise the level and quality of public debate.

And we believe that the struggle to preserve the future of our planet is not about us. It's about you. Greenpeace speaks for 2.8 million supporters worldwide, and encourages many millions more than that to take action every day.

We take the name of our flagship, the Rainbow Warrior, from a North American Cree Indian legend. It described a time when humanity's greed has made the Earth sick. At that time, a tribe of people known as the Warriors of the Rainbow would rise up to defend her.

As one of the longest banners we've ever made summed things up, "When the last tree is cut, the last river poisoned, and the last fish dead, we will discover that we can't eat money..."