Tzeporah Berman

Tzeporah Berman

Tzeporah Berman, June, 2006
Born (1969-02-05) February 5, 1969
London, Ontario
Nationality Canada
Education Ryerson University,
University of Toronto
Occupation Environmental activist, campaigner, writer
Known for Clayoquot Sound logging protests; co-director of Greenpeace International's Global Climate and Energy Program, Co-founder PowerUp Canada and ForestEthics.
Spouse(s) Chris Hatch
Website www.tzeporahberman.com

Tzeporah Berman (born February 5, 1969) is a Canadian environmental activist, campaigner and writer. She is known for her role as one of the organizers of the logging blockades in Clayoquot Sound, British Columbia in 1992–93. The protest against the logging of the temperate rainforest was, at the time, the largest act of civil disobedience in Canadian history.[1] Working with Greenpeace, Berman has helped bring the clearcut logging of Canada's rainforest to international prominence. She has worked on the Great Bear Rainforest campaign, and the Boreal campaign. She is a strategic advisor on clean energy, oilsands and pipelines for many environmental, First Nations and philanthropic organizations. She has been co-director of Greenpeace International's Global Climate and Energy Program, Executive Director and Co-founder of PowerUp Canada and Co-founder and Campaign Director of ForestEthics.

In 2009, Berman served on British Columbia’s Green Energy Task Force. The task force, appointed by Premier Gordon Campbell, was charged with making recommendations on the development of renewable energy for the province. Berman was one of the experts in the environmental documentary The 11th Hour, produced by Leonardo DiCaprio. She was named as one of six Canadian nominees for the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship social entrepreneur of the year award, one of "50 Visionaries Changing the World" in Utne Reader and as "Canada's Queen of Green" in a cover story by Readers Digest. She was included in the Royal British Columbia Museum permanent exhibit of “150 people who have changed the face of British Columbia.”

Early life

Born Susanne Faye Tzeporah Berman, she grew up in London, Ontario, the third of four siblings in a middle-class Jewish family. Her father owned a small advertising company and her mother had a business that made promotional flags and pennants.[2] The family spent summers at her mother’s family's cottage in Lake of the Woods. Her father died when Berman was in her early teens and her mother died two years later. Her older sister, Corrine, who was then twenty, persuaded the authorities to allow the four children—including her other sister Wendy and younger brother Steven—to remain together until Corrine turned twenty-one and could assume legal custody.[3]

After high school, Berman moved to Toronto to attend Ryerson University's fashion arts design program. While she was successful in design—Harry Rosen, who judged the school's final show called her a “bright light on Canada’s fashion scene”—she found a new calling and switched to environmental studies at the University of Toronto.[2]

Career

In 1992, Berman travelled to the Carmanah Valley on Vancouver Island to do fieldwork on threatened seabirds. The following year when she returned to continue her survey, she found that a logging crew had clear-cut the hillside. In 1993, the Clayoquot Sound Land Use Decision had granted pulp-and-paper giant MacMillan Bloedel rights to clear cut two thirds of a 650,000 acre lowland coastal temperate rainforest—the largest of its kind in the world. Berman joined with Valerie Langer and members of Friends of Clayoquot Sound in the growing Clayoquot protests. That summer, Friends of Clayoquot Sound and Greenpeace launched blockades against the logging. Berman came to national and international attention as one of the spokespersons for the protests, which employed nonviolent civil disobedience tactics taught in a series of peace camps in Tofino and in high-profile locations such as Stanley Park in Vancouver.[4][5] The blockades lasted for five months and became the largest act of civil disobedience in Canadian history; over 850 people were arrested.[1]

Berman played a key role in the negotiations between MacMillan Bloedel (now owned by Weyerhaeuser), the activists and the First Nations. MacBlo agreed to hand over its logging rights in Clayoquot Sound to native-controlled companies who would keep the old-growth forests intact. However, the deal did nothing to end the polarization between the logging industry and the activists; clearcut logging of old growth forests in Canada continued. A poll by Greenpeace found that only 14% of Canadians supported the MacBlo deal.[5]

By the late 1990s, Greenpeace had been successful in Europe using ad campaigns against companies engaging in practices considered damaging to the environment. In 2000, Berman co-founded ForestEthics, a group devoted to using tactics that would convince companies to change their ways or risk loss of sales. One of Berman's first successful actions was the Victoria’s Secret campaign. The company had been printing a million copies per day of its glossy catalogues using paper from old-growth timber. The ForestEthics campaign initiated street-theatre demonstrations and fake fashion ads to force the undergarment manufacturer to consider changing its practices. After a few weeks, Berman was able to negotiate different wood-pulp sources with company management. Similar campaigns targeting Staples and Office Depot led them to reconsider using old-growth timber. The strategy was not just to tell companies what they should stop doing, but rather "what they should continue doing and start doing in order to stay in business but avoid protests."[5]

See also

References

Notes

  1. 1 2 The Canadian Encyclopedia. Clayoquot Sound. Historica Dominion. Retrieved on: 2012-11-08.
  2. 1 2 Glave, James (November 1, 2009). "Tzeporah Berman's Green Idea." Vancouver Magazine. Retrieved: 2013-08-06.
  3. ↑ Langlois, Christine (November, 2009). “The Queen of Green.” Readers Digest. Retrieved: 2013-07-22.
  4. ↑ Berman, Tzeporah, with Mark Leiren-Young. (2011). This Crazy Time: Living our environmental challenge. Toronto: Alfred A. Knopf Canada. ISBN 9780307399786
  5. 1 2 3 Saunders, Doug (May 24, 2011). "Greenpeace: tactics not so clear cut anymore." Globe and Mail. Retrieved: 2013-08-06.

Bibliography

Books by Berman

Articles by Berman

Articles about Berman

Interviews

Video
Audio

External links

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