About Us
the campaign to stop genetically engineered trees
The Campaign to STOP GE Trees is a national and international alliance of organizations that have united towards prohibiting the ecologically and socially devastating release of genetically engineered trees into the environment.
Global Justice Ecology Project (U.S.) coordinates, administrates and fundraises for the campaign.
Our Approach
The effort to permanently stop GE trees is reaching a critical stage. It is essential to have a broad network of organizations, grassroots groups, alliances, and coalitions that are informed and mobilized to spread the word about the GE tree threat to their constituencies and activate them on the issue. The Campaign to STOP Genetically Engineered Trees was started to do just that.
Our Mission
The mission of the Campaign to STOP Genetically Engineered Trees is to protect forests and biodiversity, and provide support to communities threatened by the dangerous release of genetically engineered trees.
Our Alliance
The Campaign is an alliance of national and international organizations with the goal to ban the release of genetically engineered trees into the environment.
Members of the Campaign
Faces Behind the Campaign︱Denis Melican
Meet the faces who make up the Campaign to STOP GE Trees. Denis Melican is a member of the American Chestnut Cooperators Foundation and is also on the Campaign to STOP GE Trees North American Coordinating Committee. Here’s what he had to say about working with the...
Faces Behind the Campaign︱Lois Breault-Melican
Meet the faces who make up the Campaign to STOP GE Trees. Lois Breault-Melican is a member of the American Chestnut Cooperators Foundation and is also on the Campaign to STOP GE Trees North American Coordinating Committee. Here’s what she had to say about working with...
Faces Behind the Campaign︱Steve Taylor
Meet the faces who make up the Campaign to STOP GE Trees. Steve Taylor is the Press Secretary of Global Justice Ecology Project and a member of the Campaign to STOP GE Trees North American Coordinating Committee. Here’s what he had to say about working with the...
Faces Behind the Campaign︱Rachel Smolker
Meet the faces who make up the Campaign to STOP GE Trees. Rachel Smolker is the Co-director of Biofuelwatch and a member of the Campaign to STOP GE Trees steering committee. Here’s what she had to say about her journey to working with the campaign. ...
Faces Behind the Campaign︱BJ McManama
Meet the faces who have supported the Campaign to Stop GE Trees. Here's what BJ McManama had to say about her journey to working with us. Every once in a while I get asked by people who don’t know me well, why I chose to be a full-time activist or, more accurately, a...
Staff
Anne Petermann, Co-Founder Global Justice Ecology Project
Anne Petermann is Co-founder and Executive Director of Global Justice Ecology Project and Co-founder and International Coordinator of the Campaign to STOP GE Trees.
Petermann has been working for the protection of forests since 1989. She co-launched the first effort to prevent the environmental release of genetically engineered (GE) trees in 2000 and has presented concerns about GE trees to parties and delegates, and organized GE trees protests at UN events, including Climate Summits, Biodiversity Conventions, Forest Forums and World Forestry Congresses, as well as industry conventions all over the world. She has also met with community groups globally about the threats posed by GE trees.
In addition to GE trees, Petermann has investigated and documented the social, ecological and economic impacts of industrial tree plantations in Africa, South America and the US., specifically regarding impacts on Indigenous Peoples, forest dependent communities, water and biodiversity.
Steve Taylor, Press Secretary
Steve Taylor has a Bachelor’s degree in physics, and a Master’s degree in Mathematics and has worked as an instructor at the college and university level. Serving on the negotiating team, Taylor was instrumental in establishing the adjunct union at St. Louis Community College.
Taylor worked as a United States Congressional press secretary from 2000 to 2012. He also worked as a registered lobbyist within the Missouri State Legislature from 1995 to 2000 fighting the expansion of the predatory gambling industry in Missouri.
Taylor won the Leo and Kay Drey Award for Leadership from the Missouri Coalition for the Environment for his founding and work of the Times Beach Action Group, which monitored and exposed fraud surrounding the remediation and incineration of waste from 27 Missouri dioxin sites. Taylor began his environmental work as an activist who fought clear cutting of hardwood stands in the Shawnee National Forest in the early 1990’s.