As a girl, she dreamed of living with the wild animals in Africa. From a very young age, she was interested in animal behaviour. Her dream was not well-received and was dismissed by her friends and family as ridiculous. She was asked questions such as: "Africa is dangerous!" You’re a girl! Africa is very far from Britain. Nonetheless, her mother advised her that to pursue such a daring dream, she would have to be strong and work very hard. Nothing could deter this young lady, Jane Goodall, from becoming the legendary titan of primatology and anthropology.
In 1960, 26-year-old Jane Goodall took a flight from Britain to start working with wild chimpanzees in Tanzania's Gombe Stream National Park. She was a curious, original and visionary whose research spanned 6 decades of dedication and resilience. She started with a cause and it turned into a mission.
She became the first person to receive a PhD in ethology from the University of Cambridge without a formal bachelor's degree. She is acclaimed for her groundbreaking discovery that chimpanzees are omnivorous, use tools, express complex emotions, form social bonds and engage in warfare, traits previously believed exclusive to humans.
Her pioneering work has been published in numerous articles in National Geographic and she has also authored over 30 books. She has won numerous prestigious awards and has been featured in over 40 documentaries. In 1991, she founded “Roots & Shoots”, a youth outreach programme that has since evolved into a global movement connecting young conservationists worldwide. She was a voice for climate change, an active keynote speaker and an inspiration to women scientists worldwide.
She believed that through collaboration, a combination of technology and tradition is needed for climate action. She stated that age-old remedies and approaches could help solve half of the problems associated with the climate crisis. She advocated for simple techniques, such as planting trees, forest restoration and protecting the Amazon and the Congo Basin. Jane Goodall stressed that people are not willing to accept the magnitude of the problem.
Her “Roots & Shoots” initiative aimed to bring people together to discuss the environment, conservation and humanitarian aspects of life. According to her, each of us matters, we make a difference in this world and we must consciously decide the kind of difference we want to create.
She did not say, “Think globally and act locally”; she believed that would bring gloom. Instead, she stated that we should “think and act locally”. And each of our actions, when compounded, will reflect a better world. She always stressed that each one of us made a difference in the world—each of the 8+ billion people matters.
According to the World Economic Forum (WEF), humans have destroyed one-third of the world's forests by expanding agricultural land. Today, the world stands at a technological and environmental crossroads that will affect the planet Earth and all its inhabitants.
The world must acknowledge the climate crisis and work towards the restoration and preservation of the natural world. There are many lessons to be learned from a legend like Jan Goodall, who is no longer with us, but has left her fingerprints of goodness and resilience that will continue to create ripples of awareness in the world. She remains in people's thoughts as an icon of dedication to science and nature conservation.
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