"I don't really know why I care so much. I just have something inside me that tells me that there is a problem, and I have got to do something about it. I think that is what I would call the God in me.

All of us have a God in us, and that God is the spirit that unites all life, everything that is on this planet. It must be this voice that is telling me to do something, and I am sure it's the same voice that is speaking to everybody on this planet - at least everybody who seems to be concerned about the fate of the world, the fate of this planet."

- Wangari Maathai

A short outline
The first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize was praised by the awarding committee as “a source of inspiration for everyone in Africa fighting for sustainable development, democracy and peace”. 

A pioneering academic, her role as an environmental campaigner began after she planted some trees in her back garden.  This inspired her in 1977 to form an organization - primarily of women - known as the Green Belt Movement aiming to curtail the devastating effects of deforestation and desertification.

Her desire was to produce sustainable wood for fuel use as well as combating soil erosion.

Her campaign to mobilize poor women to plant some 30 million trees has been copied by other countries.

“It took me a lot of days and nights to convince people that women could improve their environment without much technology or without much financial resources.”

The Green Belt Movement went on to campaign on education, nutrition and other issues important to women.

Mrs Maathai has been arrested several times for campaigning against deforestation in Africa.

In the late 1980s, she became a prominent opponent of a skyscraper planned for the middle of the Kenyan capital’s main park - Uhuru Park.

She was vilified by President Daniel arap Moi’s government but succeeded in thwarting the plans.

More recently, she evolved into a leading campaigner on social matters.

Once was beaten unconscious by heavy handed police. On an other occasion she led a demonstration of naked women.

In 1997, she ran for president against Mr Moi but made little impact.

But in elections in 2002, she was elected as MP with 98% of the votes as part of an opposition coalition which swept to power after Mr Moi stepped down.

She was appointed as a deputy environment minister in 2003.

Mrs Maathai says she usually uses a biblical analogy of creation to stress the importance of the environment.

“God created the planet from Monday to Friday. On Saturday he created human beings. The truth of the matter is… if man was created on Tuesday, I usually say, he would have been dead on Wednesday, because there would not have been the essential elements that he needs to survive”.

The Nobel Peace Prize committee praised her for taking “a holistic approach to sustainable development that embraces democracy, human rights and women’s rights in particular”. She thinks globally and acts locally, they said.

She was born in 1940 and has three children.

Her former husband, whom she divorced in the 1980s, was said to have remarked that she was “too educated, too strong, too successful, too stubborn and too hard to control”.

More about...
Wangari Muta Maathai was born in Nyeri, Kenya (Africa) in 1940. The first woman in East and Central Africa to earn a doctorate degree, Prof. Maathai obtained a degree in Biological Sciences from Mount St. Scholastica College in Atchison, Kansas (1964). She subsequently earned a Master of Science degree from the University of Pittsburgh (1966). She pursued doctoral studies in Germany and the University of Nairobi, obtaining a Ph.D. (1971) from the University of Nairobi where she also taught veterinary anatomy. She became chair of the Department of Veterinary Anatomy and an associate professor in 1976 and 1977 respectively. In both cases, she was the first woman to attain those positions in he region. Wangari Maathai was active in the National Council of Women of Kenya in 1976-87 and was it chairman in 1981-87. It was while she served the National Council of Women that she introduced the idea of planting trees with the People in 1976 and continued to develop it into broad-based, grassroots organization whose main focus is the planting of trees with women groups in order to conserve the environment and improve their quality of life. However, through the Green belt Movement she has assisted women in planting more than 20 million trees on their farms and on schools and church compounds.

In 1986 the Movement established a Pan African Green Belt Network and has exposed over 40 individuals from other African counties to the approach. Some of these individuals have established similar tree planting initiatives in their own countries or they use some of the Green belt movement methods to improve their efforts. So far some countries have successfully launched such initiatives in Africa (Tanzania, Uganda, Malawi, Lesotho, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe etc). In Sept. 1998 she launched a campaign of the Jubilee 2000 coalition. She has embarked on new challenges, playing a leading global role as a co-chair, of the Jubilee 2000 Africa Campaign, which seeks cancellation of the unpayable backlog debts of the poor countries in Africa by the year 2000. Her campaign against land grabbing and rapacious allocation of forests land that has caught the limelight in the recent past.

Wangari Maathai is internationally recognized for her persistent struggle for democracy, human rights and environmental conservation. She has addressed the UN on several occasions and spoke on behalf of women at special sessions of the General Assembly for the five-year review of the earth summit. She served on the commission for Global Governance and commission on the future. She and The Green Belt Movement have received numerous awards, most notably The 2004 Nobel Peace Prize. Others include The Sophie Prize (2004), The Petra Kelly Prize for Environment (2004), The Conservation Scientist Award (2004), J. Sterling Morton Award (2004), WANGO Environment Award (2003), Outstanding Vision and Commitment Award (2002), Excellence Award from the Kenyan Community Abroad (2001), Golden Ark Award (1994), Juliet Hollister Award (2001), Jane Adams Leadership Award (1993), Edinburgh Medal (1993), UN’s Africa Prize for Leadership (1991), Goldman Environmental prize (1991), the Woman of the World (1989), Windstar Award for the Environment (1988), Better World Society Award (1986), Right Livelihood Award (1984) and the Woman of the Year Award (1983). Prof. Maathai was also listed on UNEP’s Global 500 Hall of Fame and named one of the 100 heroines of the world. In June 1997, Wangari was elected by Earth Times as one of 100 persons in the World who have made a difference in the environmental arena. Prof. Maathai has also received honorary doctoral degrees from several institutions around the world: William’s college, MA USA (1990), Hobart & William Smith Colleges (1994), University of Norway (1997) and Yale University (2004).

The Green Belt Movement and Prof. Wangari Maathai are featured in several publications including The Green Belt Movement: Sharing the Approach (by Prof. Wangari Maathai, 2002), Speak Truth to Power (Kerry Kennedy Cuomo, 2000), Women Pioneers for the Environment (Mary Joy Breton, 1998), Hopes Edge: The Next Diet for a Small Planet (Frances Moore Lapp? and Anna Lapp?, 2002), Una Sola Terra: Donna I Medi Ambient Despres de Rio (Brice Lalonde et al, 1998), Land Ist Leben (Bedrohte Volker, 1993)

Prof. Maathai serves on the boards of several organizations including the UN Secretary Generals Advisory Board on Disarmament, The Jane Goodall Institute, Women and Environment Development Organization (WEDO), World Learning for International Development, Green Cross International, Environment Liaison Center International, the WorldWIDE Network of Women in Environmental Work and National Council of Women of Kenya.

In December 2002, Prof. Maathai was elected to parliament with an overwhelming 98% of the vote. She was subsequently appointed by The President, as Assistant Minister for Environment, Natural Resources and Wildlife in Kenya’s ninth parliament.

Tag: Wangari Maathai, Nobel Peace Prize 2004