Bruno Van Peteghem (1950s – 24 August 2022, in

New Caledonia New Caledonia ( ; ) is a group of islands in the southwest Pacific Ocean, southwest of Vanuatu and east of Australia. Located from Metropolitan France, it forms a Overseas France#Sui generis collectivity, ''sui generis'' collectivity of t ...

) was awarded the

Goldman Environmental Prize The Goldman Environmental Prize is a prize awarded annually to grassroots environmental activists. History Awardees are named from each of the world's six geographic regions: Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, an ...

in 2001, for his campaign to place the island's

coral reef A coral reef is an underwater ecosystem characterized by reef-building corals. Reefs are formed of colonies of coral polyps held together by calcium carbonate. Most coral reefs are built from stony corals, whose polyps cluster in group ...

(among the world's largest and most unusual) on

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...

World Heritage List World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural heritag ...

in order to protect the reef against destruction from

nickel Nickel is a chemical element; it has symbol Ni and atomic number 28. It is a silvery-white lustrous metal with a slight golden tinge. Nickel is a hard and ductile transition metal. Pure nickel is chemically reactive, but large pieces are slo ...

mining Mining is the Resource extraction, extraction of valuable geological materials and minerals from the surface of the Earth. Mining is required to obtain most materials that cannot be grown through agriculture, agricultural processes, or feasib ...

industries.Goldman Environmental Prize
Bruno Van Peteghem
(Retrieved on 10 November 2007)

References

1950s births 2022 deaths New Caledonian environmentalists Place of birth missing Goldman Environmental Prize awardees New Caledonian people of French descent {{environmentalist-stub