A man on a mission

Tony Juniper is indisputably one of the most effective environmental campaigners of our time. 

It is only right then, that he should win the coveted accolade of becoming a Daisy Green God.

The ENDS report described him as ‘One of the top ten environmental figures of the last 30 years.’, Country Life named him as ‘one of the 100 people who are making the decisions that affect your life’. 

He was once director of Friends of the Earth, now stands as a Green candidate for Cambridge, advises several international companies on green matters, sits on numerous influential steering groups and is an advisor to the Prince of Wales. He is also an accomplished author. 

Perhaps less well known is that he is one for the birds. Once a professional ornithologist he is seriously into parrots as we found out when we managed to slow him down for long enough to answer a few questions for us. 

Hi Tony. Thanks for sparing the time to talk to us. After visiting tonyjuniper.com I found out you have a passion for parrots. Is this true?
Yes, I had a childhood interest in birds and kept an aviary as a child. I kept canaries and budgies, bred cockatiels and through that developed more of a love and knowledge of parrots. Many years later I finished up working at Birdlife International where I was parrot conservation officer, and it was my job to stop them from going extinct. 

Out of over 300 species of parrot in the world, a high proportion are at risk of going extinct, some severely so. This includes the spix’s macaw, which I wrote a book about some years after my work at Birdlife.

Those birds are instantly eye catching and recognisable to everybody, and a fantastic ambassador for the rainforest, and I learnt so much about them and the rainforest at Birdlife, I finished up working with Friends of the Earth as the leader of the rainforest campaign, so the connection is very strong in many people’s minds between the birds and the rainforest. 

So your desire to ‘saving the world’ was driven by your passion for wildlife and nature?
Exactly. From a very early age I felt drawn to nature and flowers, plants and birds, the whole thing, and developed an extensive knowledge of the most incredible, precious things. As my life developed I became more convinced that I should do something about its destruction as well as appreciating and enjoying it. 

I finished my degree at Bristol in 1983 and decided to go on and do something more practical and immediately linked to the emergency at hand. This lead me to work in more conservation and environmental stuff, and I’m still doing it now. 

Your regard for wildlife is something you share with Prince Charles who you advise. Is that linked to the Prince’s Rainforest Project?
It’s a lot broader than that now. We have this thing called the International Sustainability Unit which is taking in agricultural, eco systems and fishing to a broader level of analysis, but he’s been doing this thinking for a number of years so it’s nothing new for him.

What we’re trying to do is assist him in finding more effective ways to investigate these subjects, as well as helping him to write his book called Harmony (very interesting piece of work which I have learnt a great deal from being involved in) which is the Prince seeking to put across a view of the main problems we have , not so much technology, not having enough policies, and different kinds of economic approaches to solve these problems, as I think we can handle all that. 

The principal problem is how we have lost this contact with nature, and we have become disconnected from nature’s cycles through what basically boils down to a crisis of perception.

Humankind now sees itself as outside nature, as being able to do what it wants, seeing itself as sitting above nature, with nature being the source of natural resources and a place to put our waste, when a more rational approach to the situation would be to see nature as a sacred presence which needs to be treated with reverence, and seeing ourselves imbedded in it rather than over it. So that perceptual crisis we explore in the book as being the problem at hand, and that will be published later this year in September. 

Are there difficulties when you’re advising Prince Charles linked to the fact that he has to be politically impartial? Does it restrict you?
He does have a role that requires him to be outside of politics in a way that creates a consensus to bring people together, and that is a very powerful and influential position to be in, and I think he does it extremely well. We quite directly stay away from politics which is what he has to do. 

We wanted to ask you about the issue of population, and the fact that high profile campaigners like Jonathan Porritt and David Attenborough have said people ought to limit their families to two children. What do you think?
I can see the logic of it up to a point. However I do think there are some dangers when talking about population if you don’t simultaneously talk about consumption, because they are flip sides of the same coin, and you ought to talk about the two of them in the same breath, because what 1 billion people living as westerners presently do is exerting a massive impact on the planet.

And if you look at the billion that are living at the bottom end of consumption in terms of energy and resources, they’re having a very small impact on the planet by comparison and if you look at how the population discussion can sometimes be a source of blame on the developing countries whose populations are continuing to increase.

I think you can inadvertently put the blame in the wrong place by thinking ‘you’re population is growing therefore you’re the problem’, when actually it is the total human impact which is the problem. 

And that is partly due to population growth but partly about consumption growth, and how we can help reduce the impact of both factors with technology and different ways of living. I do accept the population argument, but I think it is more complicated than just pointing the finger at growing human numbers. 

You are a Green candidate for Cambridge. Some people that don’t have a Green candidate in their area. How do you recommend they vote?
In the longer term, can you find someone who is willing to be a Green candidate? If not, you have to look at the individuals who are running and ask yourself where they stand on issues like climate change, ecological taxation, what they think about the future of agriculture, what they would say about the linkages between social justice and the environment.

Just look at what the individuals who are standing have to offer. It’s vital to use your vote whether you have a green candidate or not. We lack an understanding of the environment in parliament, which is why I joined the Green Party in 2008. 

Do you see a lot of positivity in the future? Is there a lot of exciting green technology on the horizon?
There’s tonnes of it! I’m just going to the Eco Build Conference this afternoon at Earls Court where there are hundreds of companies showcasing hundreds of different solutions to the challenges we face. There isn’t a shortage, what we have is an economic system that isn’t valuing itself properly. We have wave and tidal power that works but still seems too expensive, and that’s why we continue to burn large amounts of coal and gas.

This is a failure of economics on one level because if the economics was done differently and we did find a way of bringing in the costs of climate change and the price of energy then we would be using wave and tidal power right away. It’s not a failure of technology, it’s partly a failure of economics and partly a failure of culture.

This all links back to the crisis of perception and how we have become disconnected with nature, and therefore out of kilter with the way the planet works. That is why the technology is not being used. 

Can you help us answer some everyday green dilemmas? Is it more important to buy locally produced food or food that is organic?
You have to use your common sense. Ideally it should be both, but if you can’t find both then you’re probably better off going for local. Growing your own produce is a very nice thing to do. The numbers are increasingly complicated, and people are concerned about air miles involved when it comes to buying green beans flown from Kenya. 

The Carbon Trust are suggesting that vegetables from the Netherlands have a higher carbon footprint that those flown from Africa [because of energy used in heating systems], so it’s not simple, and you have to use your common sense and have our ‘development brain’ on at the same time and recognise that we don’t want to cut ourselves off. We never would, as there are things like bananas, tea, coffee and chocolate which we can’t grow here, so we’re always going to be importing those. Keeping things fair trade adds another dimension. 

Another dilemma – I try to favour local, independent shops and farmer’s markets but should I shop in major supermarkets sometimes and buy goods that are more ethical to send them the message that that’s what the buyer wants?
Definitely. I think most people’s shopping is quite mixed, and not many people only use local shops, and it’s important that the big retailers get the message, which you can also send to them by using local shops, in terms of produce and the relationship we want with our food, so both points are valid. 

Finally, we always ask our green gods to nominate a green goddess. Who would yours be?
Well, I would have to say my wife…