Scientists
and conservationists argue that primatologist Jane Goodall should receive the
Nobel Peace Prize in 2019.
Goodall’s
groundbreaking research uncovered startling revelations, including tool use by
chimpanzees, that blurred the lines between humans and animals.
Goodall, a
U.N. Messenger of Peace, now travels around the world to encourage living in
harmony with the natural world.
More than 30
scientists and leaders in environmental conservation are calling for the
Norwegian Nobel Committee to award Jane Goodall with the 2019 Nobel Peace
Prize.
Citing the
84-year-old primatologist’s groundbreaking discoveries in the 1960s that
blurred the lines between animals and humans, such as tool use in chimpanzees,
as well as her ongoing, decades-long campaign to protect our planet, the group
argues that her life’s work has been a quest for global harmony.
Young
researcher Jane Goodall with baby chimpanzee Flint at Gombe Stream Research
Center in Tanzania. Image © the Jane Goodall Institute/Hugo van Lawick.
Her early
work studying chimpanzees in Gombe National Park, situated in what would become
Tanzania, revealed that “our similarities with animals are far greater than are
our differences,” writes the group of researchers, authors and teachers from 16
countries, on the website Change.org.
“We must see
ourselves as partners not only with other humans, but also with chimpanzees and
all the other creatures who walk, swim, crawl, and fly on the face of the
earth,” they add.
At the time
of publication, more than 2,600 people had signed the online petition in
support of the prize for Goodall.
Moses
Andama, a community forest monitor and a resident of Nyantonzi in Uganda, with
water, sanitation and hygiene reading material distributed in his community by
the Jane Goodall Institute. Image © the Jane Goodall Institute Uganda/Apophia
Jemimah.
The
coalition argues that Goodall’s work demonstrates the importance of a broad
interpretation of what peace on Earth means.
Today, as
she has for decades, Goodall travels some 300 days a year, speaking as an
advocate for the environment and as a United Nations Messenger of Peace. Her
message, though one of warning that humanity and the planet on which we depend
are at a crossroads, is also flecked with hope that all is not lost.
“The lust
for greed and power has destroyed the beauty we inherited, but altruism,
compassion and love have not been destroyed,” Goodall wrote in The New York
Timesin 2017. “All that is beautiful in humanity has not been destroyed. The
beauty of our planet is not dead but lying dormant, like the seeds of a dead
tree. We shall have another chance.”
Students
from Wildlife Warriors share their Roots & Shoots project with Jane Goodall
in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Image by the Photoz — Roots & Shoots Malaysia.
In 1977,
Goodall founded the Jane Goodall Institute, which supports projects ranging
from agroforestry to micro-lending to primate research. Roots and Shoots, a
program the institute started in 1991, focuses on environmental education,
encouraging young people around the world to make sustainable choices. Goodall
also leads by example — she’s a vegetarian out of concern for the treatment of
animals and the damage that industrial livestock farming can inflict on the
environment.
“Jane’s
message to us is that there are no substitutes for peaceful coexistence,” the
group writes. “For humans, who have the power to destroy the Earth, its
inhabitants, and all types of landscapes, peace is something far greater than
merely the lack of warfare among humans.
“A Nobel
Peace Prize for Jane Goodall underscores that humans must not be at war with
nature,” they say, “but rather that true harmony and peace is only possible
when humans live sustainably on our planet.”
A Jane
Goodall Institute forestry project, where land has been dedicated to growing
consumable plants and timber, allowing deforested areas bordering on Gombe
(visible on the mountains behind) to regenerate naturally. Image by Nick Riley.
Banner image
of Jane Goodall with orphan chimpanzee Uruhara at the Sweetwaters Sanctuary in
Kenya by Michael Neugebauer.
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