Happy Birthday Agent Green! 10 Years of Effective Investigations, Exposures and Positive Change

10 years ago, the non-governmental environment organisation, Agent Green, made a commitment to Romania’s nature: to fight for its protection.
Founder and president Gabriel Paun had always felt connected to nature and feared the rising pressures on nature. The increased and broadened destruction gave him the final push in 2009 to start the organisation, Agent Green.

Article by Alina Florescu

Only by daring did they have the chance to make a change. And they did! Impressive, resilient and insistent, Agent Green’s contribution to the actual state of Romania’s most pristine areas’ conservation is unwavering today, but now, needs to continue more than ever.
The first projects and actions Agent Green started ten years ago were against waste and litter in the environment but soon the organisation started focusing on forests and doing their first investigations and actions for which they are now widely known.

The core of Agent Green’s mission is to serve nature’s real needs. As the Romanian state often acts against nature, the organisation has shown that community mobilisation and consistency do lead to victories. One example is the success that exposed and prevented the destruction of the nature surrounding Sarmizegetusa Regia, a 2000-year-old historical military centre which is now enscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List.
All of Agent Green´s successes were possible only together with their passionate supporters who love nature and are willing to get active to speak up for nature.

Through its investigative profile, Agent Green occupies a niche in Romania and chooses objectives carefully, trying to force change, which otherwise seems unreachable. The organisation is currently running more than 30 cases in court with different forestry administrators. In 2018 Agent Green has, like many years before, publicly protested and therefore helped raise the awareness of logging in protected areas, showing footage which has been wide reaching in the Romanian media and has also been shown on international media.

“Do not forget that Planet Earth is nearly 5 billion years old, where millions of fauna and flora species have evolved naturally and coexisted in harmony. We, the humans, came only less than 1 million years ago and are vitally dependent on nature’s resources. But we are wasting them at rapid speed. Romania’s nature is blessed, we have the biggest tracts of rich and very old forests left in the European Union. We still have forests untouched and preserved for thousands of years. Romania should be proud of them. And therefore, we must act together and constantly push for the better protection of our forests.” says Gabriel Paun, Agent Green’s president.

Action by Agent Green in front of the EU nature directors meeting in Brasov (April 8, 2019)
Agent Green´s president Gabriel Paun together with Member of the European Parliament Thomas Waitz at an action in Domogled National Park in May 2018
Fagaras Natura 2000 Site, Romania – March 10, 2017: Agent Green and international forest protectors (including scientists and mountaineers) stop logging trucks in Fagaras Mountains Natura 2000 site and call on Romanian Government to take action saving Europe’s last large primary forests in Romania.