Our people

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Our team Supervisory board Founders Lecturers Volunteers

Maria Westerbos

Founder, Director, Board

Maria strategically paves the way for PSF and does so with humour. She founded the organisation in 2011 because she wants to make the world a bit more beautiful.

Jeroen Dagevos

Head of Programs

Jeroen focuses on tackling the negative effects of plastic pollution at its source. His ambition is to create a truly circular economy without leakage of plastics to the environment.

Annemarie Nederhoed

Head of Operations

Annemarie is on top of every aspect of our projects, ensuring PSF delivers the best for its mission. She is also responsible for fundraising.

Digital Content & Communication

Elles Tukker

Communications Manager

Elles believes in the power of language and hopes to make PSF an even stronger communicator in order to convince both industry, consumers and journalists of the need to fight the plastic tsunami.

Carina van Uffelen

Online communication & web coordination

Carina coordinates the data side of World Cleanup Day & Trash Hunters. She produces digital content and she’s one of the initiators of the P for Plastic movement!

Laura Diaz Sanchez

Campaigner Microplastics

Laura is responsible for the Ocean Clean Wash Campaign and manages all online content for it. She is also behind the new version of My Little Plastic Footprint app which helps reduce plastic in daily life.

Madhuri Prahbakar

Campaigner Beat the Microbead

Madhuri manages the Beat the Microbead campaign & is responsible for our international social media channels. She also co-created the Plastic Diet along with Laura to help reduce plastic consumption in daily life.

Lisette van Effrink

Campaigner Health

Lisette campaigns on the effects of plastic on human health and she organizes the world‘s first Plastic Health Summit. Being a passionate surfer & a proud mom she’s eager to protect the ocean and future generations from the harmful effects of plastics.

Robert Möhring

Campaigner Trash Hunters

Robert campaigns for World Cleanup Day, Trash Hunters & Clean Rivers (Schone Rivieren). His mission is to prevent single-use plastics ending up in the environment.

Enora Regnier

SEA/SEO Specialist (freelance)

Enora manages our Google advertisements, she takes care of our websites’ visibility & makes sure our online presence is growing. She aims for a zero waste lifestyle or at least, a zero plastic waste one!

Janne Biersma

Online communication

Janne manages our social media and is our community manager. She also supports us in other online communications.

Woltera Niemeijer

Grafisch designer (freelance)

Woltera has developed the corporate identity of the Plastic Soup Foundation and is responsible for the design of a large part of all communications.

Research

Harmen Spek

Manager Innovations & Solutions

Harmen focuses on solutions & innovations for all PSF projects and campaigns. He loves common-sense solutions in our plastic environment.

Michiel Roscam Abbing

Advocacy & Author

Michiel has been working for PSF since its foundation as a researcher. He is author of Plastic Soup Atlas of the World a book that has been published in a number of languages, including Japanese.

Anna van der Vliet

Research & Development

Anna has a background in environmental law and anthropology and is doing research & development for Plastic Soup. She loves bouldering, learning, and the environment; she hates plastic pollution and late-stage capitalism.

Sophie Vonk

Researcher Health

Sophie coordinates the Plastic Health Lab, in which consumer products are tested for chemical additives & microplastics.

Education

Wendela van Asbeck

Manager Education

Wendela is responsible for all our educational programs & activities. Meanwhile, she’s always looking for fundraising opportunities and she tries to bring more people on board with a plastic-free lifestyle!

Janna Selier

Education Support

Janna facilitates donations and sponsorships of companies and individuals. She’s also responsible for our webshop and the administration of our educational kit.

Elfie de Jong

Education and communication

Elfie takes care of the communication within the education projects and helps to optimize our online communication.

Finance, Office management & Fundraising

Irene Vreeken

Financial Controller

Irene is taking care of all our financial activities and makes sure we run a tight ship. She’s one of our most active users of the Beat the Microbead app as she deeply cares about the issue of microplastics.

Martje Rozmus

Office manager

Martje coordinates the efforts of our guest teachers and our educational program. She is very caring and serves the team a plastic-free and vegetarian lunch every day. To do so, she cycles through half the city to have glass jars filled at the market.

Milou de Ruig

Fundraiser

Milou is our fundraiser for individuals and companies and is responsible for raising donations. Milou is also the contact person for our Business Angels & Ambassadors and tries to get the most out of every collaboration.

Honorary Chairman

Charles Moore

Honorary chairman

Charles Moore discovered the plastic soup in 1997 during a sailing race on the Pacific Ocean. From that moment on, he turned the wheel around and decided to deal with this environmental disaster. Charles is an inspiration to all of us and many people, including the Plastic Soup Foundation team, have since followed in his footsteps.

Last but not least!

Pip

Joy & Happiness manager

Jacqueline Cramer

Chair

Charles de Klerk

Secretary

Freek Stoové

Board member Legal Affairs

Expertise: Juridisch

Betteke de Gaay Fortman

Board member

Jacco Maan

Board member

Patrick Klink

Board member

Expertise: (Online) media and communication

Founding Fathers

Jack van Ham

Chairman in our early days

Jack van Ham was chairman of the board in the 1st phase of professionalization: ‘Mede om ervoor te zorgen dat er ook middelen konden worden geworven om nog meer te kunnen betekenen in de strijd tegen wereldwijde plastic vervuiling en het gebruik ervan. Momenteel ben ik gepensioneerd. Eerder was ik CEO van het Nederlandse Rode Kruis en Voorzitter van de Raad van Bestuur van ontwikkelingsorganisatie ICCO.’

Dieter Croese

Treasurer 2014 - 2020, posthumous

‘Ik ben dankbaar dat ik vanaf 2014 structuur en financiële rust heb kunnen bieden als penningmeester. Mede door de CBF-accreditatie is de organisatie stevig gegroeid. De missie van Plastic Soup Foundation verdient het deze groei door te zetten, zodat komende generaties kunnen genieten van de natuurlijke pracht van onze planeet.’

Peter Keijzer

Yannick Overzee

Photographer

Yvonne Sjamaar

Translator

Our people

Maria Westerbos

Jeroen Dagevos

Annemarie Nederhoed

Digital Content & Communication

Elles Tukker

Carina van Uffelen

Laura Diaz Sanchez

Madhuri Prahbakar

Lisette van Effrink

Robert Möhring

Enora Regnier

Janne Biersma

Woltera Niemeijer

Research

Harmen Spek

Michiel Roscam Abbing

Anna van der Vliet

Sophie Vonk

Education

Wendela van Asbeck

Janna Selier

Elfie de Jong

Finance, Office management & Fundraising

Irene Vreeken

Martje Rozmus

Milou de Ruig

Honorary Chairman

Charles Moore

Last but not least!

Pip

Jacqueline Cramer

Charles de Klerk

Freek Stoové

Betteke de Gaay Fortman

Jacco Maan

Patrick Klink

Founding Fathers

Jack van Ham

Dieter Croese

Peter Keijzer

Carola Janssen

Christy ter Braak

Els Timmerman

Gaby Kronemeijer

Helga van Kooten

Ingrid Lammerse

Lonneke Crusio

Menno Haeck

Mirjam Schober

Pauline Wilbrenninck-Geers

Peter Siegel

Petra Olgers

Thijs Wetemans

Angela Donkers

Anouk van den Ham

Caroline Mackie

Christian Bruno

Daisy Termorshuizen

Graham John Head

Hansje Weijer

Jane Pulford

Joanna Bouma

Moritz Menzel

Nicola Chadwick

Robbin Besselink

Ronja Jansz

Sander Kooijman

Susanne Spee

Tanja Chung

Yannick Overzee

Yvonne Sjamaar

About us

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