Friends of the Earth International

Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) is an international network of grassroots environmental organizations in 73 countries. About half of the member groups call themselves "Friends of the Earth" in their own languages; the others use other names. The organization was founded in 1969 in San Francisco by David Brower, Donald Aitken, and Gary Soucie after Brower's split with the Sierra Club because of his opposition to the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant. They received funding from Robert O. Anderson, founder of the ARCO petroleum company. It became an international network of organizations in 1971 with a meeting of representatives from four countries: United States, Sweden, the UK and France.