CHOI YUL

WHY HIM? Choi Yul has fought hard for the environment—and sometimes he’s been punished for it. In 1988, he became the first chairman of the Korean Anti-pollution Movement and began campaigning against irresponsible disposal of nuclear waste, for which he was put under house arrest. Since then, he has established the Korean Federation for Environmental Movement, which gathered eight environmental groups under its umbrella, and the Korea Green Foundation, which runs diverse programmes tackling a variety of environmental issues.