About us
About us
The mission of the nonprofit organization Vegan Society Luxembourg (VSL) is to promote veganism, through educating and raising awareness on the positive impact of a vegan lifestyle on animal rights, our environment as well as our health. The VSL supports the development of veganism to fight animal cruelty and exploitation, lower our carbon footprint, reduce the effects of climate change, and reduce the risks of health issues. A registered non-profit organization, the VSL organizes various public activities and events in the social, political, and educational fields.
MEET OUR 2024-2025 COMMITTEE
The new committee of the VSL, elected in April 2024, are all dedicated volunteers driven by the motivation to promote the transition to veganism on all levels of society. Together we raise awareness on animal ethics, the impact of veganism on our environment, as well as on healthier ways to eat and live.
BARBARA UJLAKI – PRESIDENT
WERNER HASLEHNER – vice president
MALOU KREINS – SECRETARY
I am very interested in nature and all the animals we share our planet with. I have been volunteering for about 20 years in different organizations for the prevention of cruelty toward animals. Within the VSL committee, I would like to help organize events and find new partners that are vegan-friendly. I want to bring people together who share the same ideas and spend good moments together. I am also keen to support people transitioning to veganism who have questions and doubts about being vegan. I have worked as a medical technical radiographer since 1999, I am married, I have 1 adoptive daughter, and share my house with many older dogs and cats.
VANESSA SIMOES – vice-secretary
Coming from a family of farmers, I was familiar with the raising and killing of animals. I had never questioned it as all my life I had been told that this was normal, natural and necessary.
In 2016 after ordering a ham panini, a video from L214 popped up on my phone. It was a video of a pig agonising in a slaughterhouse, and at that moment I realised that no meal was worth the suffering I had just witnessed.
After a few months, I learned about the egg and dairy industry and have since decided to do the best I could to live vegan. Feeling the numerous positive impacts it had on my health and learning the good it was doing to the environment made the switch even easier.
CATHY BLESER – treasurer
I decided to become vegan in 2017 after being a vegetarian for 5 years. Realising that the dairy and egg industry is just as harmful to animals and our planet as the meat industry, I couldn’t justify supporting them with my consumption choices. Even as a student with a rather small budget and a love for food and cooking, it always felt very manageable to keep up with my vegan lifestyle. Aside from food I also enjoy different sports, art and design.
sanran gulsen – vice-treasurer
I am a marathoner and a diver. When I was a child, I rode my bicycle along Geniz Delta of Izmir where countless Flamingo and other local and migrating birds live. I grew up with a love of nature, sea, the underwater and wild animals while having no empathy for sentient beings we called livestock or seafood.
I always loved sports and since childhood have been sensitive to a variety of foods. So, when I was an adult, I started testing different diets hoping to feel better and have a better health. I tested everything from Keto to Mediterranean, low carb to no whites…
In 2019, I travelled to the Kalahari desert of South Africa where the Bushmen also live. I saw people living in poor conditions with no water to drink, yet saw the majority of freshwater in the rivers is going to fields growing food for livestock. I woke up. I immediately switched to vegetarian upon my return to Luxembourg.
Later I read a book called „Eat and Run“, and I woke up to the reality of the dairy and eggs industry as well. To me it didn’t make sense that we wanted to save animals while eating animals, or waste the majority of resources feeding livestock while some humans are malnourished.
When I switched to vegan, I broke my all time running personal bests every single day for a month. It was undeniably clear to me that humans were herbivores. Today, I run 6 marathons per year, engage in long distance endurance events without preparation, trusting my plant-based high protein nutrition.
PAVAN MELUKOTE – committee member
My vegan journey began in 2005 when I visited a silk farm. During a demonstration, they explained that silk cocoons are boiled with the silkworms inside. I asked why they wouldn’t wait for the worm to emerge, and they said the cocoon would be punctured, ruining the thread. That horrified me, and I gave up silk and leather that day. Raised vegetarian, I didn’t connect this to dairy yet, but I began avoiding products tested on animals. In 2015, a documentary on the dairy industry led me to go vegan in 2016, driven by ethical consistency.
Two years later, I started a vegan venture creating nutritionally complete vegan meal supplements, which I exited in 2019/2020. Since then, I’ve deepened my interest in nutrition through courses and enjoy cooking vegan meals that are nutritionally balanced.
Becoming vegan was a pivotal step in aligning my values with my actions. As part of the Vegan Society, I aim to promote veganism however I can. I enjoy connecting with fellow vegans and working toward a world that sees animals as beings who share this planet with us and deserve equal respect.
NATHALIE JENERAL – COMMITTEE MEMBER
In 2019, during the pregnancy of my third child, I embraced a vegan lifestyle after watching “The Game Changers.” As a mother of four, an international legal and an investment professional in the plant-based field, I’ve always been passionate about nutrition, a healthy lifestyle, and sports. My research revealed that all proteins originate from plants, leading me to adopt a whole-food, plant-based diet. Over time, I’ve learned how to live sustainably, eliminating animal products from all aspects of life. This journey inspired me to write a children’s book on living a healthy, long life as a vegan. I joined the VSL to raise awareness about the benefits of a plant-based lifestyle.
ELISABETH WIOT – COMMITTEE MEMBER
I stopped eating meat at the age of 11 after watching a documentary at school about a slaughterhouse. I never questioned my vegetarian diet until 2010 when all of a sudden I suffered from severe allergies to eggs and dairy. This is when I started looking for more information about nutrition and veganism in particular. I wish I had done this earlier as I finally discovered, among other things, the ugly truth about the dairy industry. I realized that adopting a vegan lifestyle is not only beneficial for my health, but it also helps reducing animal suffering, animal exploitation and our impact on the environment. I’m happy to join the VSL team to help raise awareness and promote veganism. In my spare time I’m also volunteering at an animal protection organization to look after abandoned and stray cats.
MINNA HJORT – COMMITTEE MEMBER
In 2006, almost ten years after I became a vegetarian for the animals, I decided to finally take the next logical step and go vegan. It was the best decision of my life. Around the same time, I became an activist and joined several animal and veganism advocacy groups in my native Finland. For example, I was on the board of Animalia, the largest animal advocacy group in the country, for several years. In recent years, however, I have been less active in the scene. When I moved to Luxembourg in 2023, I was excited to find that there was an active Vegan Society here, and I was happy to join its committee in 2025. I am a language professional, and I share my life with one human and two animal (cat & dog) companions.
SARAH THINES – COMMITTEE MEMBER
I’ve been vegetarian since I was 10 and vegan for the past two years. My choice comes from a deep connection to animals and from learning about the realities behind the egg, dairy, and meat industries, as well as products tested on animals. It has also made me more aware of the environmental impact of our food choices.
I love nature and animals, and it doesn’t make sense to me to live a lifestyle that contributes to harming them.
Veganism, for me, is about compassion and respect for all living beings, recognizing that we all deserve love and share the capacity to feel.
Your help is needed!
You can support the VSL in many ways, by becoming a member, through a donation or by helping with our activities. Thanks to your support, we can regularly organize various events and raise awareness on veganism, inform people or just show that veganism can be easy, tasty and meaningful.
Upcoming events
Donate
The more members the better reach we have.
The more members an organization has, the more say it gets in political, social, educational, and business matters.
Through your annual contribution, we can organize campaigns and do lobbying.
Become Member
Political partners
Together we are strong! Therefore, the Vegan Society Luxembourg attaches great importance to international cooperation with other organizations and platforms.
Votum Klima
‘Votum Klima’ – an initiative of Caritas Luxembourg, Action Solidarité Tiers Monde, Mouvement Ecologique and Greenpeace – shows that the climate and energy policy reversal of Luxembourg is possible!
The Votum Climate platform, founded in 2009, is sponsored by the following 26 non-governmental organizations in the United Kingdom: Aid for the Defense of India, Action Public Transport, the Association of Soutien aux Travailleurs lmmigrés (ASTI), Action Solidarité Tiers Monde (ASTM) ATTAC Luxembourg, Bio-Luxembourg, Bridderlech Share, Caritas Luxembourg, Center for Ecological Learning Luxembourg (CELL), Cercle de Coopération, Conference of the Jeunesse Luxembourgeoise (CGJL), Catholic Church in Luxembourg, Ethics, Eurosolar Luxembourg, Fairtrade Luxembourg, Frères the Hommes, Greenpeace Luxembourg, Handicap International, the Commission Justitia et Pax, the Luxembourg Velocity Initiative, Mouvement Ecologique, nature & environment, SOS Faim Luxembourg, UNICEF, Vegan Society Luxembourg.
