Surfers Against Sewage – Campaigns, Conservation and Climate

Hugo Tagholm is an Honorary Graduate of the University (DsC, 2019) and founder and Chief Executive of the national marine conservation and campaigning charity Surfer’s Against Sewage (SAS). He works passionately to educate people and combat plastic pollution and poor water quality. 

SAS was set up 30 years ago this year, in response to the then chronic sewage pollution issue, which was similar to the plastic pollution crisis we have today. It started with the people who were most affected by the pollution – surfers.

The work of the charity is to tackle plastic pollution, improve coastal and river water quality, raise awareness of global heating and support the call to protect 30% of our ocean over the next decade. SAS are proud to empower over 100,000 beach clean volunteers annually; lead 700 Plastic Free Communities nationwide; inspire over a million school children through their Plastic Free Schools programme; and help raise the issues with policymakers through their Ocean Conservation group in Westminster.

Hugo became involved in marine conservation and campaigning through his love of wildlife, nature and the great outdoors. He said “I consider nature, and particularly the ocean, as my first passion and my greatest accomplishment to date is developing SAS into the global force that it is today and empowering a brilliant team around me. I strongly believe in the power of collective effort and would like to thank my team and trustees who continue to make such a valuable contribution to the UK’s marine conservation effort.

“I’m also very proud to have recently announced SAS’ new Patron, His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales, the Duke of Cornwall. Having this support means a huge amount to SAS as HRH has been promoting these issues for four decades.”

SAS has had many successes since it started and Hugo is particularly proud of the work they have done on plastic pollution in recent years, mobilising, connecting and empowering our supporters as a unified voice to call for policy and legislation change on single-use plastics. In collaboration with other campaigning groups, they have been instrumental in delivering the plastic bag charge, a commitment to a deposit return scheme on plastic bottles and the imminent ban on plastic straws, stirrers and cotton bud sticks. These interventions will prevent billions of items of plastic from being produced and reduce the tide of plastic pollution.

There is a varied array of challenges climate change has caused our earth and Hugo believes some of the biggest ones are “the rewilding and full protection of our natural world which will be central to a sustainable future where we exist in equilibrium with the planet.”

Hugo said: “In order to protect our natural world and build a sustainable future, we need to enforce and monitor highly-protected ecosystems; we must restore mangroves, kelp forests and seagrass meadows to sequester carbon; we must plant trees in the face of global heating; and give biodiversity the space to recover.

 “We need to continue to make the case to protect much bigger swathes of land and sea to allow the planet to recover. We can take action on plastic pollution from the beach front to the front benches of Parliament. Our delivery model supports a grassroots local approach to the global issues facing our oceans, including plastics and we will provide our volunteers and supporters with tangible actions they can take to be a part of this change. Together we will demand a decade of radical action that will protect the ocean.”

 

Plastic Pollution at Penhale Beach (c) SAS Greg Martin 

Hugo at Godrevy beach in St Ives, April 2019 (c) Richie Graham 

HRH Prince Charles announced as SAS' new patron on 6 March 2020