WANGARI MAATHAI

“Education, if it means anything, should not take people away from the land, but instill in them even more respect for it, because educated people are in a position to understand what is being lost. The future of the planet concerns all of us, and all of us should do what we can to protect it. As I told the foresters, and the women, you don't need a diploma to plant a tree.”
― Wangari Maathai, Unbowed

Today, April 22nd, is celebrated as Earth day. What started in 1970 with 20 million people, now has over one billion people participating in support of this mission. April 22nd, 1970 was chosen as it was a weekday that fell between spring break and final exams to allow for maximum student participation. 51 years later, it is young girls and boys, women and men, who have the greatest stake in our planet’s future, are at the forefront of this campaign.

April 22nd is also the day we remember and celebrate the pioneers. Wangari Maathai, a young Nigerian woman in 1960, had the unique opportunity as part of the AirliftAfrica Program to attend University in the U.S. She returned to Nigeria with a vision to transform the environment, ravaged by years of environmental damage. She founded the Green Belt Movement in 1977, which taught Nigerian women to plant trees in deforested areas and earn income from the land. 30,000 women were trained, and over 51 million trees were planted. Wangari Maathai was recognized with the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004, the first African woman to receive that honor. Professor Maathai’s legacy (she was the first woman in East & Central Africa to earn a Ph.D.) continues through her Green Belt Movement, now with a mission to build a Great Green Wall, 8,000 kilometers long of greenery, in Africa.

Information sources:

[https://www.earthday.org/history/]

[http://www.greenbeltmovement.org/wangari-maathai]

[Unbowed: A Memoir - Wangari Maathai]