Only a few days into 2026, around 15 thousand liters of drilling fluid leaked out of the well where Brazilian oil company Petrobrás has been drilling, near the Amazon River Basin. This area is well known for having an almost completely pristine ecosystem, that is still considered unexplored and home to the Great Amazon Reef.

According to the company, the leak was identified on 4 January 2026, at more than 9 thousand feet deep in the sea. Petrobrás announced a plan to halt activities for 15 days and stated that the fluid is composed of a mixture of solids, liquids and chemicals.

This is not an isolated incident but an alert, having been warned about in 2025 by a delegation formed by Greenpeace Brazil, local NGOs, Quilombolas, Indigenous movements and fishermen communities, in a filed lawsuit in the Federal Court against Brazilian Environmental Agency IBAMA, Petrobrás and the Brazilian State. The delegation requested the immediate suspension of activities and the cancellation of the operating license granted to Petrobras for exploration.

This latest leak has a direct relationship with the environmental risks pointed out during  the licensing process. An oil spill near the Amazon River Basin can be devastating to the delicate ecosystem of the region, and to the local communities who depend on a healthy ocean for their livelihoods. Information about the leak was taken to the lawsuit, in which the authors reiterate the urgency of an immediate action by the Federal Court in suspending the operating license.  

According to a lawyer from Greenpeace Brazil, between 1975 and 2014, operations of this type were responsible for 95.22% of the accidents recorded on drilling platforms and production in deep water. The impacts and risks are obvious, so the judicial measure of suspension of activities is necessary, based on the principles of prevention and precaution.

Oil exploration in the Amazon is a real, predictable and an avoidable risk. Still, drilling continues, even with insufficient environmental impact studies, without consultation with impacted communities and without assessment of climate impacts. It’s time for fossil fuel phaseout and a just transition that puts people, dignity, and a fossil-free future first.

Respect the Amazon

Ask political leaders to act on their promises to stop Amazon destruction.

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Marlon Marinho is a Multimedia Editor with Greenpeace International. 

In 2025, journalist Saabira Chaudhuri released Consumed: How Big Brands Got Us Hooked on Plastic, an investigation into how global consumer goods companies built entire business models around disposability. One chapter in particular stands out: how Unilever helped turn the single-use sachet into a dominant packaging format and how that decision continues to fuel plastic pollution on a global scale.

As negotiations toward a Global Plastics Treaty intensify, the insights in Consumed remain urgently relevant, and increasingly uncomfortable for Unilever.

How Unilever drove the sachet crisis

A business model engineered around disposability

Chaudhuri shows how Unilever’s India arm industrialised the sachet, transforming a small local innovation into a global mass-market strategy. Sachets unlocked ‘previously unreachable’ low-income markets by enabling small, frequent purchases — turning low-cost items into a multi-billion-unit sales engine.

This wasn’t primarily about meeting consumer demand. It was about creating a profitable disposable business model.

Marketing that reshaped behaviour

Unilever’s push didn’t stop with packaging. The company invested heavily in rural outreach: mobile cinema vans, in-home demos, and campaigns presenting branded shampoo as ‘modern’ and aspirational. Traditional low-waste practices were displaced by single-use products designed to be thrown away after use. The company invested heavily in marketing tactics, and unfortunately they worked. 

The fallout: billions of sachets with nowhere to go

Once sachets took off, the environmental consequences were immediate and severe. Tens of billions of sachets are used annually in India alone – almost none recycled, because they were never designed to be. Waste accumulates in waterways, drainage systems, and informal dumps, disproportionately affecting communities without formal waste services.

Corporate dependence on sachets

Chaudhuri argues that brands like Unilever are now locked into disposability. Despite sustainability promises, the company continues to rely on sachets for volume and margins, even as the pollution becomes impossible to ignore.

Greenpeace International’s 2023 Unilever Uncovered report found the company was on track to sell around 53 billion sachets in 2023 – 1,700 every second – making it the world’s biggest corporate seller of plastic sachets. What’s more: less than 0.2% of Unilever’s plastic packaging is reusable, demonstrating how far its business remains from a genuinely circular model.

So where is Unilever in its sachet journey, now? 

The company has so far…

Scaled a packaging system it knew lacked any viable end-of-life solution
Normalised sachets through aggressive marketing and behavioural engineering
Exported that model to markets across Asia and beyond
Lobbied against government policy like sachet bans
Continued to rely heavily on sachets, despite public pressure
Acknowledged that sachets need addressing, dating back over a decade
Made some bold statements about seeking solutions
Invested in pilot reuse and refill projects and R&D to test alternatives
🆇 Mapped out its path to transition away from sachets
🆇 Shown true accountability for the widespread harm it has caused to communities and ecosystems

For a company that positions itself as a sustainability leader, the pace of progress towards real solutions to this massive social, environmental and reputational disaster needs to be faster. Sachet and single-use plastic packaging pollution is not a new problem. Unilever s customers, impacted communities, and the public have waited long enough for something better. 

The real alternative: Reuse is already working

While Consumed explains how the world ended up awash in sachets, communities are demonstrating what genuine solutions look like.

In Manila, Philippines, neighbourhood stores are already operating as reuse and refill hubs, offering affordable and accessible alternatives to sachets. These systems deliver consumer savings and retailer benefits while dramatically reducing waste. A pilot project in India yielded similar results replacing sachets with refillable shampoo bottles allowing access to refill services. This replicable initiative that prevented over 5,000 sachets from entering the waste stream is being rolled out in other countries. Reuse pilots have existed and popped up all around the world. The reason they aren’t expanding further or thriving in certain contexts isn’t because there is a lack of interest or because the model flawed, but because corporations hadn’t set them up to succeed and haven’t invested meaningfully and across sectors to support the policy change and concerted effort needed to properly support the reuse revolution. 

Unilever must change course

Successful reuse and refill models show that sachets aren’t a necessity. They’re a corporate choice — one with deeply inequitable impacts. Saabira Chaudhuri’s Consumed exposes how Unilever helped build a throwaway system that communities worldwide are now forced to live with. Shifting off sachets could very well take just as much intention as convincing people to shift to them, but if Unilever has proven anything, it’s that it’s capable of shifting a market. 

The next chapter is up to Unilever’s leadership. To align with public expectations, environmental responsibility, and the direction of the Global Plastics Treaty, Unilever must:

• Commit to a global, time-bound phase-out of sachets
• Invest in reuse and refill systems at a scale matching its plastic footprint
• Support the reduction of out of control plastic production
• Shift innovation, design and marketing away from disposability
• Support a strong Global Plastics Treaty that prioritises reduction and reuse

Continuing the status quo is no longer credible or acceptable.

Anna Diski is a Senior Campaigner from Greenpeace UK. Sarah King is a Senior Strategist for the Plastic Free Future campaign. 

Amsterdam, Netherlands – Greenpeace International is deeply concerned about the most recent illegal military action by President Donald Trump against Venezuela, violating both international law and his constitutional powers as US president.

Claiming de-facto control over the country, Trump stated that the US would be “very strongly involved” in the country’s oil industry.

“Venezuela holds the largest proven crude oil reserves in the world. Trump’s own words make it clear that control and exploitation of those reserves is his current priority. In an era of accelerating climate breakdown, eyeing Venezuela’s vast oil reserves this way is both reckless and dangerous. The only safe path forward is a just transition away from fossil fuels, one that protects health, safeguards ecosystems, and supports communities rather than sacrificing them for short-term profit,” warned Mads Christensen, Executive Director, Greenpeace International. 

At this critical moment, the rights, safety, and interests of the Venezuelan people must come first. Venezuelans should have the right to peacefully determine their own future free from coercion and violence. The situation must not be allowed to be exploited for short-term oil profiteering or extractive gain by foreign governments or corporations. 

“The international community must now act decisively to uphold international law and prevent further harm. Governments should reject unilateral military intervention, demand an immediate de-escalation, and reaffirm the UN Charter’s prohibition on the use of force for political or economic gain. Diplomatic efforts must prioritise civilian protection, independent monitoring of human rights and environmental risks, and accountability for any violations.”

“Crucially, states must resist efforts to exploit the crisis for fossil fuel expansion and instead mobilise financial, legal, and political support for a just transition that serves the Venezuelan people — not oil interests,” said Christensen.

The people of Venezuela have endured years of political turmoil, economic hardship, and deep social suffering, much of it intensified by extractive dependence and external pressure. It is clear that stability will not come through oil fields or military force. It is time to chart a different path. By mobilising climate finance, debt relief, and international support for a just transition to clean energy, governments can help deliver real improvements in livelihoods, protect ecosystems, and support a recovery grounded in dignity, self-determination, and a fossil-free future shaped by people, not profit.

ENDS

Contact: Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0)20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org

Looking back at 2025, our oceans have failed a key planetary health check for the first time posing a bigger threat to entire marine ecosystems and the communities whose livelihoods primarily depend on them. In the same year, capitalism significantly continues to serve billionaires deriving ridiculously extreme wealth from their polluting industries -or even having an out of touch lavish Venice wedding– while our planet must keep paying a high price for the environmental damage caused by the impacts of the crisis they helped create.

Then we witnessed COP 30 in Brazil’s Belém not long ago, where thousands of Indigenous people participated bringing the demarcation of territories as the main demand to contain the climate crisis to global leaders and governments, making COP30 as the first climate conference with the biggest Indigenous presence ever recorded. Also in the same year, hopeful actions happened worldwide representing the core of Greenpeace’s values, and so did some most significant climate victories.

With some of these reflections, here are 6 inspiring books discussing oceans, critiques of capitalism, the Indigenous fight for environmental justice, and hope—for your upcoming reading list this year.

The Deepest Map: The High-Stakes Race to Chart the World’s Oceans

by Laura Trethewey (2023)

This book reminds me of the statement saying that people hear more about the moon and other planets in space than what lies beneath Earth’s oceans, which are often cited as ‘scary’ and ‘harsh’. Through investigative and in-depth reportage, ocean journalist and writer Laura Trethewey tackles important aspects of ocean mapping.

The mapping and exploration can be very useful to understand more about the oceans and to learn how we can protect them. On the other hand, thanks to neoliberal capitalism, it can potentially lead to commercial exploitation and mass industrialisation of this most mysterious ecosystem of our world.

The Deepest Map is not as intimidating as it sounds. Instead, it’s more exciting than I anticipated as it shows us more discoveries we may little know of: interrelated issues between seafloor mapping, geopolitical implications, ocean exploitation due to commercial interest, and climate change.

The Code of Capital: How the Law Creates Wealth and Inequality

by Katharina Pistor (2019)

Through The Code of Capital, Katharina Pistor talks about the correlation between law and the creation of wealth and inequality. She noted that though the wealthy love to claim hard work and skills as reasons why they easily significantly generate their fortunes, their accumulation of wealth would not last long without legal coding.

“The law is a powerful tool for social ordering and, if used wisely, has the potential to serve a broad range of social objectives: yet, for reasons and with implications that I attempt to explain, the law has been placed firmly in the service of capital,” she stated.

The book does not only show interesting takes on looking at inequality and the distribution of wealth, but also how those people in power manage to hoard their wealth with certain codes and laws, such as turning land into private property, while lots of people are struggling under the unjust system.

The Intersectional Environmentalist: How to Dismantle Systems of Oppression to Protect People + Planet

by Leah Thomas (2022)

Arguing that capitalism, racism, and other systems of oppression are the drivers of exploitation, activist Leah Thomas focuses on addressing the application of intersectionality to environmental justice through The Intersectional Environmentalist. Marginalised people all over the world are already on the front lines of the worsening climate crisis yet struggling to get justice they deserve.

I echo what she says, as a woman born and raised in Indonesia where clean air and drinkable water are considered luxury in various regions, where the extreme weather events exacerbated by the climate crisis hit the most vulnerable communities (without real mitigation and implementations by the government while oligarchies hijack our resources).

I think this powerful book is aligned with what Greenpeace has been speaking up about for years as well, that social justice and climate justice are deeply intertwined so it’s crucial to fight for both at the same time to help achieve a sustainable future for all.

As Long As Grass Grows

by Dina Gilio-Whitaker (2019)

Starting with the question “what does environmental justice look like when Indigenous people are at the centre?” Dina Gilio-Whitaker takes us to see the complexities of environmental justice and the endless efforts of Indigenous people in Indian country (the lands and communities of Native American tribes) to restore their traditional cultures while healing from the legacy of trauma caused by hundreds of years of Western colonisation.

She emphasizes that what distinguishes Indigenous peoples from colonisers is their unbroken spiritual relationship to their ancestral homelands. “The origin of environmental justice for Indigenous people is dispossession of land in all its forms; injustice is continually reproduced in what is inherently a culturally genocidal structure that systematically erases Indigenous people’s relationships and responsibilities to their ancestral places,” said Gilio-Whitaker.

I believe that the realm of today’s modern environmentalism should include Indigenous communities and learn their history: the resistance, the time-tested climate knowledge systems, their harmony with nature, and most importantly, their crucial role in preserving our planet’s biodiversity.

The Book of Hope

by Jane Goodall and Douglas Abrams with Gail Hudson (2021)

The Book of Hope is a marvelous glimpse into primatologist and global figure Jane Goodall’s life and work. The collaborator of the book, journalist Douglas Abrams, makes this reading experience even more enjoyable by sharing the reflective conversations between them, such as the definition of hope, and how to keep it alive amid difficult times.

Sadly, as we all know, Jane passed away this year. We have lost an incredible human being in the era when we need more someone like her who has inspired millions to care about nature, someone whose wisdom radiated warmth and compassion. Though she’s no longer with us, her legacy to spread hope stays.

Ocean: Earth’s Last Wilderness

by David Attenborough and Colin Butfield (2025)

 “I could only have dreamed of recording in the early stages of my career, and we have changed the ocean so profoundly that the next hundred years could either witness a mass extinction of ocean life or a spectacular recovery.”

The legend David Attenborough highlights how much humans have yet to understand the ocean in his latest book with Colin Butfield.  The first part of it begins with what has happened in a blue whale’s lifetime. Later it takes us to coral reefs, the deep of the ocean, kelp forest, mangroves, even Arctic, Oceanic seamounts, and Southern Ocean. The book contains powerful stories and scientific facts that will inspire ocean lovers, those who love to learn more about this ecosystem, and those who are willing to help protect our Earth. 

To me, this book is not only about the wonder of the ocean, but also about hope to protect our planet. Just like what Attenborough believes: the more people understand nature, the greater our hope of saving it.