Dr Tom Appleby is an Associate Professor at the University of the West of England and Chief Legal Adviser of the UK-based conservation organisation, Blue Marine Foundation.  Over the years he has worked on a huge range of pioneering marine legal projects in the UK, Europe and across the world.  He has been researching key questions around the public ownership of salmon farms, and the siting and location of open pen farms in inappropriate locations.

Maximiliano Bello has worked for numerous organizations to advance marine conservation priorities, including the Pew Charitable Trusts, Oceana, World Wildlife Fund, Mission Blue, Island Conservation, and Patagonia. In 2019 he served as the UNFCCC COP25 Presidential Committee Ocean Representative. 

He has worked with governments around the world to establish marine protected areas and was instrumental in securing protections for over 2.3 million squared kms of territorial waters. He has advanced degrees in natural resources management and economics and has completed over 100 dives.

In 2022, Max was awarded the Orden de Manuel Amador Guerrero by the government of Panama for his work to protect the Cordillera de Coiba, the first fully marine protected area to be established in the eastern tropical pacific corridor. He is a distinguished fellow with the Latin American Program of the Wilson Center in Washington, DC, an advisor to the Ocean Leader’s Program at Edinburgh University in Scotland, and advisor to the Great Whale Conservancy and SeaLegacy. 

Captain Cornelissen has participated in more than 25 Sea Shepherd campaigns, beginning as Chief Cook, rising through the ranks to become Captain. After six years on the ships, he spent another six years running a successful campaign in the Galapagos Islands as the Director of Operations.

In his current role as Chief Executive Officer for Sea Shepherd Global, Captain Cornelissen guides global operations. Leading a highly capable team of professionals that spans five continents, he oversees a wide array of international public-private partnerships, manages country agreements, and is responsible for the movements of all vessels in Sea Shepherd Global’s fleet.

Captain Cornelissen is an expert on illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing as well as marine wildlife protection.

Over the last eight years the organization has broadened its conservation reach by partnering with countries worldwide to combat IUU fishing. This has resulted in the arrest of nearly 100 vessels.

Francesco De Augustinis is a freelance journalist and documentarian specialising in food and environmental issues. He works with different media outlets such as Mongabay, The Guardian, Corriere della Sera, EuObserver, Repubblica, The Huffington Post, The Ferret.

In 2019 he founded the independent media project on sustainability ONE EARTH doc. Through this project, he took part in different international investigative projects and produced three documentaries about food, ethics and sustainability.

Eva Douzinas is the President of the US-based Rauch Foundation which invests in financial literacy for youth and research into global food systems, with a particular focus on industrial carnivorous fish farming.  Previously, Eva was the Co-President and CFO for Veson Nautical Corporation, a commercial maritime software company based in Boston that Eva co-founded in 2003 and led until the sale of the company in 2017. Since 2018, as Board Chair, she has devoted a significant amount of her time to the non-profit cultural and environmental center she co-founded in Greece, Katheti AMKE, serving the Troizin region and headquartered on the island of Poros. Eva also serves as a trustee on the board of Anatolia College in Thessaloniki. 

A dual citizen of the US and Greece, Eva earned a B.A. in economics from Wesleyan University and an M.B.A. from New York University’s Stern School of Business.

Anthi was born and raised in Piraeus with lineage from Chios island. She graduated from Athens Law School, where she also attended post-graduate studies in Public Law. She worked as a maritime lawyer for almost 2 decade, first as a partner in a maritime law firm and later on as an in-house legal consultant in Greek shipping companies. More recently she has focused her practice as an attorney-at-law on issues relating to the protection of the marine environment and the construction and operation of ports or marinas. In parallel, she is also involved in the consumer protection movement, working as a legal consultant of the oldest Greek Consumer federation INKA.

Christopher Gobler is a Distinguished Professor and an Endowed Chair within the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences (SoMAS) at Stony Brook University.  He received his M.S. and Ph.D. from Stony Brook University in the 1990s and began his academic career as a professor at Long Island University (LIU) in 1999.  In 2005, he joined Stony Brook University as the Director of Academic Programs for SoMAS on the Stony Brook – Southampton campus.  In 2015, he was named Director of the New York State Center for Clean Water Technology.  He has been editor-in-chief of the peer-reviewed Elsevier journal, Harmful Algae, since 2018.  His research aims to understand how anthropogenic activities (climate change, eutrophication, overharvest of fisheries) alter the ecological and biogeochemical functioning of coastal ecosystems and to discover approaches for restoring impaired coastal ecosystems.  He has published more than 250 manuscripts in international, peer-reviewed journals and has had more than 50 graduate students.

Ann Golob is director of research for the Rauch Foundation. Previously she oversaw the Long Island Index, an indicators project of the Foundation whose motto was, “Good information presented in a neutral manner can move policy.” Some of the biggest successes of that effort were moving NYS to invest $2.6 billion in the building of new rail infrastructure and helping Long Islanders understand the pressing need for more affordable housing. Trained as a cultural anthropologist and completing a dissertation on the history of Jesuit missionaries in the Amazonian jungle, Golob then worked for 20 years in the technology arena for major banks and insurance companies. In her spare time, she weaves, quilts and spends as much time as possible with her delightful grandkids. 

Natasha Hurley is Feedback Global’s Director of Campaigns on Trade, Finance and Global Supply Chains. She has run high-profile campaigns targeting irresponsible practices in corporate supply chains for most of her career and spent several years on the UN Montreal Protocol and UNFCCC circuits lobbying for higher ambition on international climate and ozone policy. She spent the first part of her career in Brussels, where she worked for the European Commission and in public affairs and strategic communications for private sector clients.                                            

A bilingual French speaker, she holds a Master’s in EU Political Studies. Alongside her role at Feedback she is a trustee for Somerset Wildlands, a game-changing new organisation creating space for nature through rewilding.   

Hannah Kapff gained a B.Sc. in Environmental Science from the University of Southampton when only three UK universities offered the course, and many thought it was an ‘esoteric subject’. The next decade saw her work as a news producer for the BBC and CNBC Europe, helping produce award-winning news, documentaries & current affairs programmes. In 2006, she took her story-telling and media skills into PR to pursue her fascination with science, technology and issues-focused projects, especially those involving health, wellbeing and the environment. Based on an ability to turn complex information into media stories, the past 15 years have seen her work for major organisations such as the UN, for blue chips (LVMH, Pfizer, Smith&Nephew), SMEs, start-ups and charities. In 2013 she founded Curious PR as a consultancy that reflected her own values and natural curiosity, to offer superlative client service and get people thinking, talking and doing things differently.

Nikos Kopsidas, with over 25 years in communications, stands out as a Corporate Communications Specialist and PR Consultant. Leading teams up to 50 and managing budgets to €10 million, he’s established strong ties with Greek media, significantly impacting communication strategies. Nikos’ expertise spans both private and public sectors, evidenced by his advisory roles to ministers and members of the Greek Parliament. Notably, as Head of PR & Marketing at Wunderman Thompson & GroupM Greece, he drove the PR enhancement and brand relaunch. His previous positions include Business Unit Director at V+ O Communication, where he managed strategies for big corporate clients and Client Service Director at IKON Porter Novelli. Educationally, Nikos holds a Bachelor Degree in Economics from the University of Athens

Giorgos Konstantinou Koutouzis is the current Mayor of Poros as of January 2024. He was born and raised on the island of Poros. After a career in shipping, he has since 2000 been involved in the production, bottling and export of olive oil in the modern family-run Troizinia olive oil processing and refining unit, which he himself founded in Karapoliti, Poros.

With significant contribution to the community, Giorgos Koutouzis is a founding member of the Consumers’ Association of Poros, an active member of the Commercial Association and a member of the Board of Directors of A.O. Poros. For over 10 years, he has served as a Councilor on the municipality of Poros including previously serving as Deputy Mayor for 7 years.

His involvement in public affairs is a reflection of his love for Poros and his fellow citizens and of his strong concern for the island’s future. He is accustomed to hard work, believes in team effort and honesty is a characteristic that has accompanied him throughout his professional and personal life.

Elina Makri is an independent journalist and media project manager. She is the General Manager of the Democracy & Culture Foundation which, among other special projects to strengthen Democracy, organizes the Athens Democracy Forum, in association with The New York Times. 

Elina studied Law in France and International and European Law in Belgium, specializing in data journalism in the USA. She began her journalistic path from European journalism and, as a Marie Curie Fellow, studied what Journalism can learn from Neuroscience and Cognitive Science.

In May 2012, she won the 1st Charlemagne Youth Prize for the European journalistic work of cafebabel.com, “Europe on the ground.” She is the founder of Oikomedia.com, a platform aiming at cross-border collaboration between media professionals and A+Ω, a data analysis platform selected and funded by Google.

She is a native of Xiromero and spends a lot of time in Astakos, where her family is from.

Andrianna Natsoulas is currently the Campaign Director for Don’t Cage Our Oceans. For over two decades she has been engaged with community-based fisheries and agricultural policies and campaigns on the international to local levels and has worked for a variety of organizations, including Food & Water Watch, the North American Marine Alliance, and the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York. Andrianna wrote the book, Food Voices: Stories From the People Who Feed Us, a collection of stories from farmers and fishermen across five countries. She continues to write short stories, fiction, and non-fiction. Andrianna has a BS from SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry and an MS from the University of Warwick. She lives in New York’s Hudson Valley, unceded territory of the Munsee-Lenape.

Executive Director and co-founder of Katheti, Fay Orfanidou, completed her undergraduate studies in Greek Civilization and holds MAs in Social Science as well as in Education and Human Rights. For 20 years, she has worked as a translator of English, Spanish, Italian, and German and also worked in the civil society field, for WWF Hellas and Fair Trade Hellas. In 2013, she co-founded cultural center, Litrivi, on Poros. For the past 30 years she has been volunteering for various organizations and has attended seminars on PM, HR, PR, and NGO management. She loves reading, playing music, singing, acting and sports, and has attended many theater, creative writing and literature workshops, as well as a 2-year seminar on educational programs at the Greek Children’s Museum. She comes from a family with deep roots on Poros and has chosen to make the island her permanent home. LinkedIn

Elias Papatheodorou is an Advisory Board member of Katheti AMKE, a member of the Green Party and active in the development of novel therapeutics mainly for orphan diseases. He has 30 years of work experience in Greece, USA and European countries. He has been involved with multiple international biotechnology companies as an executive manager or Board member. He has been active member of the Green Ecological movement for many years with a special interest in the well-being of marine ecosystems, sustainable transport and the transition to a sustainable zero emissions economy. He has served as secretary, international secretary and representative to the European Green Party of Ecologist Greens. He has studied at Ithaca College and Cornell University. Elias is also a part-time resident of Poros, Greece.

Joanna Sullivan, professor of climate diplomacy, and founder and CEO of Conscience Consulting which advises EU and global institutions, business leaders and civil society on building bridges for a more sustainable and equitable world. Joanna is passionate about building coalitions to foster resilience against complex global challenges. 
As Professor of Climate Diplomacy at the European Institute and published author of ‘Creating Sustainability Champions’  Joanna is a regular contributor and moderator of panel debates. Joanna shares decades of experience of high-level strategic communication and multi-country advocacy campaigns, specialising in food systems, climate and nature policy solutions.

Joanna is Anglo-Irish dual nationality, moving to Brussels to work in the European Parliament, now a Brussels resident of 30 years. Before founding Conscience, Joanna was campaigns director at Friends of the Earth Europe, and communications director at the European Consumer Organisation.