Image: Action For Nature
Nicolina Pappas, the 13-year-old single-use plastic campaigner from Rock Island, Illinois, is fighting plastic pollution through her company, Nicolina’s Turtle Co., and her Skip the Plastic Campaign. The campaign has reached 14 cities in the United States and secured 14 official proclamations, while the company has raised more than $15,000 for conservation. Her efforts earned second place, alongside winners from Kenya and India, in the age group for children aged eight to 13 at the 2025 International Young Eco-Hero Awards. Those awards recognise young people aged eight to 16 who take practical action against climate change, pollution and wildlife loss. The campaign’s proclamations cover more than 250,000 residents across Illinois and Iowa, yet Nicolina did not stop at the city level. She authored state resolutions that made April 1 Skip the Plastic Day across Illinois, and she testified before both the state House and the Senate.
Nicolina told Action For Nature, the San Francisco non-profit behind the awards, that she has learned she can achieve much more by recruiting partners and asking for advice than by doing everything on her own. Her most recent project, the Skip the Plastic Campaign, follows the same principle. It asks restaurants to provide plastic items only on request and invites customers to politely decline them. There is no mandate, a choice rooted in Nicolina’s understanding of environmental justice and the financial burden that bans can place on underserved communities. She now wants to take the Skip the Plastic Campaign to other states and eventually to the federal level, and she hopes to become a marine biologist or a lawyer.