On Sunday, environmentalist and Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai passed away in Nairobi at age 71. Among her many accomplishments was the founding, more than three decades ago, of an organization that encourages planting trees to prevent erosion, among other benefits.
The Green Belt Movement, which she founded in 1977, began as a nongovernmental organization in Kenya and has since expanded its efforts internationally. The movement has been responsible for the planting of 45 million trees in Kenya and, through its Billion Trees Campaign, has a goal of planting a billion trees worldwide.
Maathai helped people understand the impacts of their actions, for better or for worse, on the environment and drew attention to the increasing desertification throughout parts of Africa. In a 2004 article, she noted that when she was growing up in central Kenya, her first language had no word for “desert.” By awarding her the prize, she wrote, “the [Nobel] committee, I believe, is seeking to encourage community efforts to restore the earth at a time when we face the ecological crises of deforestation, desertification, water scarcity and a lack of biological diversity.”
The Green Belt Movement initially helped Kenyan communities set up tree nurseries and plant seedlings on public lands, as well as encouraging farmers to allow trees to be planted on their land. Although its primary focus was environmental—preventing erosion, restoring deforested areas, preventing the water shortages and crop failures that often accompany deforestation—it took on a social aspect as well by creating jobs for women and providing a renewable source of firewood. It also promoted the planting of fruit trees and other edible crops in areas where farmers had given over most of their land to cash crops like coffee, which made them dependent on the vagaries of the international market.
Over the years, the grassroots movement expanded its reach to include education and promotion of sustainable development, and it adopted GIS technology to monitor the success of its efforts and aid in land-use planning.
Maathai won the Nobel Prize in 2004, the first environmentalist to do so.