Olivia Mandle

Olivia Mandle
Born
Olivia Mandle Navarro

2007 (age 18–19)
Barcelona, Spain
Occupations
  • Environmental activist
  • animal rights activist
Years active2019–present

Olivia Mandle Navarro (born 2007) is a Spanish environmental and animal rights activist from Barcelona. She leads the campaign #NoEsPaísParaDelfines ("Spain is no country for dolphins"), which asks the Spanish government for a law to close the country's dolphinariums, and in April 2023 she delivered more than 150,000 signatures in its support to the Congress of Deputies.[1] Spanish media have dubbed her "the Spanish Greta Thunberg".[2]

Mandle created the Jelly Cleaner, a homemade floating device for collecting microplastics from the sea surface, and is an ambassador of the European Commission's European Climate Pact and of the La España Azul expedition. She has published her first book, Sí es cosa tuya, and in 2023 began presenting Kanviem?, a programme about climate change in Catalonia, on the 3Cat platform.

Early life

Mandle was born in Barcelona in 2007.[3] Her environmental activism started at twelve, when she visited an exhibition in New York about the effects of global warming; she has recalled being struck by a National Geographic cover showing a plastic bag floating in the water, and names primatologist Jane Goodall, oceanographer Sylvia Earle and broadcaster David Attenborough among her role models.[4] She wants to study marine biology and to open a marine sanctuary in the Empordà, on the Costa Brava.[5]

Activism

Mandle began her climate activism in 2019, at the age of twelve, when she created the Jelly Cleaner, a device for collecting microplastics from the surface of the sea.[6] The device floats, is built from household materials such as two plastic bottles and a pair of old tights, and traps small plastic particles in the mesh; the European Commission has noted that its main effect is the curiosity it arouses among beachgoers, which Mandle uses to talk about plastic pollution.[7]

At thirteen, she started a petition on Change.org asking that the last three dolphins at Barcelona Zoo be moved to a marine sanctuary; it gathered more than 57,000 signatures, but the dolphins were instead transferred to the Attica Zoological Park in Athens.[8] She then sent weekly certified letters to Sergio Antonio García Torres, the director general for Animal Rights in the Spanish government, until she obtained a meeting with him to ask for a ban on dolphinariums in Spain.[9] She later launched a second petition, #NoEsPaísParaDelfines, addressed to prime minister Pedro Sánchez and backed by the Bottlenose Dolphin Research Institute and the cosmetics retailer Lush, which created a soap in its support, asking for a law to close Spain's dolphinariums, which then numbered 11 of the 30 in Europe and held more than 55 per cent of the continent's captive dolphins.[10]

In May 2021 Mandle was invited to the Senate by its first vice-president, Cristina Narbona, to present the campaign, which by September 2022 had passed 136,000 signatures.[11] A proposal along the campaign's lines was presented in the Senate by the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party in 2021, and Mandle took part in the public hearing on the animal protection bill.[12] The animal welfare law eventually passed in March 2023 left dolphins out, and by mid-2024 the petition had passed 158,000 signatures.[13]

On 20 April 2023 Mandle delivered the petition, by then with more than 154,000 signatures, to the Congress of Deputies, accompanied by the organisation World Animal Protection, marine biologists and the actress Clara Lago; about ten dolphinariums were still operating in Spain at the time.[14]

Other work

Mandle is one of the more than 130 ambassadors of the European Commission's European Climate Pact, and also an ambassador of the La España Azul expedition.[15] Her first book, Sí es cosa tuya ("It is your business", Ediciones B), recounts how, as a small child at a dolphinarium, she first learned about the reality of captivity.[16] Also in 2023 she began presenting Kanviem?, a programme on the new Catalan streaming platform 3Cat in which she examines the effects of climate change in Catalonia.[17]

Awards

The Jane Goodall Institute has described Mandle as a "young inspiration",[18] and gave her its international Mini Heroína award for her career.[19] The Food and Agriculture Organization named her one of its Food Heroes for World Food Day 2023.[20] In 2026 Forbes Spain included her in its 30 Under 30 list.[21]

References

  1. ↑ "Recogen 150.000 firmas para prohibir el cautiverio de delfines en España" [150,000 signatures collected to ban the captivity of dolphins in Spain]. El Periódico (in Spanish). 20 April 2023. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  2. ↑ Calderón, Anna (21 September 2022). "¿Quién es la Greta Thunberg española?" [Who is the Spanish Greta Thunberg?]. EFE (in Spanish). Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  3. ↑ "Olivia, la Greta Thunberg española contra los acuarios: "Los delfines se suicidan en los delfinarios"" [Olivia, the Spanish Greta Thunberg against aquariums: "Dolphins commit suicide in dolphinariums"]. El Español (in Spanish). 20 April 2023. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  4. ↑ Foraster, Lucía (12 September 2022). "Una adolescente contra los microplásticos del Mediterráneo" [A teenager against the microplastics of the Mediterranean]. El País (in Spanish). Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  5. ↑ León, Pablo (11 November 2020). "Crecer en tiempos de covid" [Growing up in covid times]. El País (in Spanish). Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  6. ↑ "Olivia Mandle, activista climática de 15 años: "Mi generación es la generación de la necesidad de hacer un cambio"" [Olivia Mandle, 15-year-old climate activist: "My generation is the generation that needs to make a change"]. Europa Press (in Spanish). 5 April 2023. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  7. ↑ "My world, my action, our planet - Olivia Mandle". European Climate Pact. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  8. ↑ "«Los milagros no existen ante la crisis climática»" ["There are no miracles in the face of the climate crisis"]. Ethic (in Spanish). Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  9. ↑ Farràs, Lorena (3 January 2021). "Olivia Mandle, tras los pasos de Greta Thunberg" [Olivia Mandle, in the footsteps of Greta Thunberg]. La Vanguardia (in Spanish). Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  10. ↑ "La Greta Thunberg española de 15 años que reúne firmas para cerrar los delfinarios de España" [The 15-year-old Spanish Greta Thunberg collecting signatures to close Spain's dolphinariums]. El Mundo (in Spanish). 12 June 2022. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  11. ↑ "¿Quién es Olivia Mandle, a la que muchos llaman ya la 'Greta Thunberg' española?" [Who is Olivia Mandle, whom many already call the Spanish 'Greta Thunberg'?]. 20minutos.es (in Spanish). 17 September 2022. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  12. ↑ Vicente, Sandra (12 July 2022). "Olivia Mandle, la Greta Thunberg española: "Somos la mayor cárcel de delfines de toda Europa"" [Olivia Mandle, the Spanish Greta Thunberg: "We are the biggest dolphin jail in all of Europe"]. elDiario.es (in Spanish). Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  13. ↑ "Olivia Mandle: «El 'lobby' delfinario me intentó desacreditar, pero todo fue con apoyos científicos y legisladores»" [Olivia Mandle: "The dolphinarium lobby tried to discredit me, but everything was done with the support of scientists and legislators"]. Climática (in Spanish). Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  14. ↑ "El 'grito' por los delfines en cautiverio llega al Congreso: la activista Olivia Mandle entrega 154.000 firmas" [The "cry" for captive dolphins reaches Congress: activist Olivia Mandle delivers 154,000 signatures]. El Español (in Spanish). 20 April 2023. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  15. ↑ "Olivia Mandle, joven embajadora climática de la UE: "Estamos al borde del abismo, tenemos que salir a la calle más"" [Olivia Mandle, young EU climate ambassador: "We are on the edge of the abyss, we have to take to the streets more"]. Europa Press (in Spanish). 19 March 2023. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  16. ↑ "«Què hi ha d'educatiu a mostrar un animal tancat?»" ["What is educational about showing a caged animal?"]. Diari de Girona (in Catalan). 14 October 2024. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  17. ↑ "200.000 hores de continguts en català i 30 estrenes exclusives: dilluns s'estrena 3Cat" [200,000 hours of content in Catalan and 30 exclusive premieres: 3Cat launches on Monday]. Ara (in Catalan). Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  18. ↑ "Olivia Mandle, la Greta Thunberg catalana: "Es el momento de dejar de comer animales"" [Olivia Mandle, the Catalan Greta Thunberg: "It is time to stop eating animals"]. La Vanguardia (in Spanish). 22 April 2023. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  19. ↑ "Olivia Mandle, la activista medioambiental de 16 años: "Las generaciones anteriores nos han dejado un planeta destruido"" [Olivia Mandle, the 16-year-old environmental activist: "Previous generations have left us a destroyed planet"]. 20minutos.es (in Spanish). 6 November 2023. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  20. ↑ "Olivia Mandle". Food and Agriculture Organization. 26 September 2023. Retrieved 19 August 2026.
  21. ↑ "Estos son los Forbes España 30 Under 30 2026" [These are the Forbes Spain 30 Under 30 2026]. Forbes España (in Spanish). Retrieved 19 August 2026.
This page is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.