Olga Speranskaya

Olga Speranskaya is a Russian scientist and environmentalist. She has been the Director of the Chemical Safety Program at the Eco-Accord Center for Environment and Sustainable Development in Moscow since 1997 and holds a master's degree in Geophysics from Moscow State University, and a doctorate in Environmental physics from the Russian Academy of Sciences. From 2010 to 2018, she was a co-chair of the International POPs Elimination Network. Speranskaya has led many campaigns against the use of organic pollutants, fought to ban the burial and transport of hazardous chemicals, and provided information to government decision-makers for policy changes in many different countries.

Speranskaya's environmental activism started in the 1990s when the Financial Times printed her essay outlining the toxic environmental issues due to the Soviet Union breaking up. When the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991, thousands of tons of obsolete chemicals and pesticides such as DDT, which had been banned in the West, were left behind, scattered throughout Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia. Improper storage and subsequent abandonment allowed them to leach into groundwater and become consumed by humans and animals, leading to birth defects and health issues.

She stated that the problem had grown to such an extent that the authorities needed a heavy push to clean up these sites. Speranskaya pressured Moscow for years through her work at the Eco-Accord Center, an independent environmental watchdog, demanding it secure the stockpiles of chemicals and clean up the enormous mess left by the Soviets.