Vandana Shiva is an absolute inspiration to the world of environmental democracy.
Learn about her amazing accomplishments today!
Introduction:
Have you ever wondered why trees can stand for hundreds or thousands of years without dying? Unlike people, trees have simple body plans and grow slowly. The resilience of trees and their ability to produce new tissues is what makes them so special and unique, but they also serve a very important purpose to the world. Growing up in the forests of the Himalayas, ecologist Vandana Shiva learned firsthand just how important these trees are.
Background:
“Everything I need to know, I learned from the forest” - Vandana Shiva
As a young girl, Vandana Shiva was surrounded by songs and poems that her mother had written about nature. This was the start of her lifetime passion and future career in ecology. In the 1970’s, Shiva started getting involved with the growing conservation movement when women from her region in the Garhwal Himalaya came out to advocate for the trees. These women were the providers of basic needs such as water and firewood, and they understood the value of the forest and what it meant for their people. Shiva documented the work of these women, who spoke of the true value of these trees to loggers, saying: “What do the forests bear? Soil, water, and pure air. Soil, water, and pure air sustain the Earth and all she bears.”
Later in her career, Shiva kept the message of these women in mind and transferred it into her work. She studied biodiversity, receiving a master’s degree in philosophy of science, and realized the importance of protecting our earth and indigenous cultures. In 1982, Shiva founded the Research Foundation for Science, Technology, and Ecology (RFSTE) in Dehra Dun, India, which helps to establish sustainable methods of farming. The RFSTE trains farmers to use eco-friendly agricultural practices and established seed banks all around India.
In 1994, Shiva became one of the founders of the Navdanya Farm, a women-centered organization that now conserves and cultivates rice, wheat, and other similar plants.
Vandana Shiva’s Message:
“We need to value nature’s biodiversity, clean water, and seeds. For this, nature is the best teacher.”
All of us living on this earth have a responsibility to make sure we take care of it. One way we can do this is to protect nature’s biodiversity by taking the forests as an example: “No species in a forest appropriates the share of another species. Every species sustains itself in cooperation with others.”
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