Al Jazeera documentary details Greenpeace's Vancouver origins

While many might not know of its Vancouver beginnings, Greenpeace is undeniably one of the largest international ‘brands’ and organizations the city has ever churned out.

The Al Jazeera World news network produced documentary “tells the story of the group’s evolution from hippies to lobbyists.” The activist organization’s foundations grew out of the great protest movements that flourished in the late-1960s in response to the weapons race of the Cold War and the ongoing American conflict in Vietnam.

When the United States announced plans in 1969 to conduct an underground nuclear test in Amchitka, some 7,000 kms northwest of Vancouver in the chain of Alaskan Aleutian Islands, it sparked the birth of Greenpeace and its first campaign to raise awareness of the potential environment fallout and stop the testing.

Ultimately, its efforts to stop testing were unsuccessful but Greenpeace continued to blossom over the decades, expanding its environmental-based activist agenda and carrying out missions and operations across the world.

From its humble beginnings in Vancouver’s Kitsilano neighbourhood, the non-governmental organization now has offices in 40 countries around the world, approximately 3 million members and an annual budget of $150-million.

Al Jazeera World: “Greenpeace – from hippies to lobbyists”

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Image: Al Jazeera World