Aileen Lucero

Led grassroots movement to ban single-use plastics in the Philippines through community-driven policy advocacy.

Aileen Lucero is the founder of Save Philippine Seas (SPS), a non-profit organization that has become a leading voice in the fight against plastic pollution in Southeast Asia. Starting as a 2010 initiative to clean Manila Bay, Lucero developed SPS into a movement that successfully lobbied for the first nationwide plastic bag ban in the Philippines (2020). This landmark policy now restricts single-use plastics in 1,600+ municipalities, preventing an estimated 2 billion plastic bags annually according to 2022 government reports. Lucero's strategy combines hyper-local beach cleanups with national policy advocacy, leveraging social media to mobilize over 500,000 volunteers since 2015. Her 2019 TEDxManila talk "How We Beat Plastic Pollution" has been viewed 2.3 million times. The organization's Plasticity Philippines conferences (held biennially since 2018) bring together innovators developing biodegradable alternatives. Lucero's work has inspired similar policies in Vietnam and Indonesia, earning her a 2021 UN Environment Programme Award. A 2023 study in Nature Sustainability credits SPS's campaigns with a 40% reduction in coastal plastic waste in Metro Manila between 2019-2022. Her current focus is expanding the 'Plastic Bank' initiative where coastal communities earn microloans for collecting ocean plastics.