Gerd Leipold was appointed to the post of Executive Director in June 2001. He has had a long association with Greenpeace, having worked for the organization in various capacities for over 20 years. In the 1980s he was Executive Director of Greenpeace Germany, before running the international disarmament campaign from 1987-92. In his role as Greenpeace’s International Executive Director, he leads the global organization, overseeing all activities.

He has a Ph.D. in oceanography and has worked as a research scientist for the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg on numerical ocean-circulation models as part of the institute’s climate research, and at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography at the University of California.