Ton Vriens, New York, USA (info@turtletree.nl)
Freelance journalist and documentary filmmaker.
Chairman and founder of Turtle Tree.
Contributes to the Saturday supplement of the Dutch newspaper NRC-Handelsblad (e.g. about the political and social situation in Haiti: ‘Beyond the Mountains’, January 2007; ‘The last days of Jean-Bertrand Aristide as President of Haiti’, March 6, 2004)
Author of The Texan Child Murders, in search of the innocence of a young mother who was executed in 2005, published by Uitgeverij Balans with a grant from the Fonds voor Bijzondere Journalistiek — a Dutch foundation supporting investigative journalism.
Recent television documentaries:
‘Looking for Victoria’, 2004, about an Argentine young woman who lost her parents during the dictatorship.
‘To Live in Terror’, 2002, about the terrorist attacks on the Jewish community in Buenos Aires in the 90’s and the bungled investigation.
Blogs about Turtle Tree’s endeavours in Haiti on http://www.laruta.nu/

Frank Bierens, Arusha, Tanzania
Frank has been a publisher and a media producer for over twenty years. A lawyer by training, he started his career as a journalist and as a consultant for the United Nations in the communications department in New York. He established his own magazine publishing company in the Netherlands and launched several magazines, including the popular online youth magazine Spunk.  Frank was also the co-editor and co-executive producer of two television series for MTV, “Rap around the world”, with famous Dutch rappers and stand-up comedians. These groundbreaking entertainment programs brought a youth audience in contact with the living conditions of their peers in developing countries. Frank is the co-founder of the Kilimanjaro Film Institute in Arusha, Tanzania. In July 2009 Frank and his family moved to Tanzania to launch a television production company that will produce local tv-programs in Kiswahili portraying the lives of ordinary Tanzanians. Frank Bierens is the author of the book “Gigataal”, a guide to new language and expressions.

Johanna de Radder, Bloemendaal, The Netherlands
Johanna has a background in architecture and design, and is an alumna of the Academy for the Arts in Rotterdam. She worked for many years as a freelance designer, stylist and pattern maker for a range of well-known whole sale garment companies in the Netherlands, including Zilch.  She ran for seven years her own clothing store in the center of Amsterdam. Recently she started Zjuup (http://www.zjuup.nl/), an online store carrying organic children clothing.  Johanna is the main distributor in the Netherlands for Turtle Tree’s Haitian products and she advises the foundation on all matters concerning design and product development.

Siebren Hodes, Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Siebren is a television producer at VPRO, a Dutch public broadcaster. He has embarked on a tall ship that will sail around the world the next eight months, following Darwin’s journey on the Beagle and filming and transmitting from aboard 35 television episodes, http://beagle.vpro.nl/  Before this mega- documentary project Siebren worked as a researcher and producer at the production company Dahl.  The company made headlines by its actions against slavery and exploitation of children in the chocolate industry and has launched its own slavery-free chocolate in the Netherlands.