Latest Wangari Maathai Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• One of the reasons why we started the Green Belt Movement is to work with these ordinary peasant farmers so as to educate them that, despite the fact that they are poor, it is in their interest to protect the soil that they have, to protect the forest they have, to protect the land that they have, because if they don't do it, things can be only worse tomorrow for them for them and for their children.

  Wangari Maathai

  Children, Land, Movement

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• Quite often when you help poor people, they don't think about the environment. They think about survival.

  Wangari Maathai

  Thinking, People, Survival

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• Monsanto will not come empty-handed. Monsanto will come with a big bag of money. And because these governments are poor, when they are shown money for their research institutions, for their universities, for their professors, they are very quick to say yes, and I can tell you that when Monsanto came to Kenya, they were able to be given permission to do research in one of our research institutions, and yet there was not a single law to control such research.

  Wangari Maathai

  Law, Government, Kenya

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• There is no reason why a company like Monsanto, for example, that is pushing GMOs, cannot go to Kenya, partner with the university, partner with the research institutions, and try to promote - in a responsible way - advanced techniques to help farmers. But this should be done in such a way that the farmers' livelihoods are not undermined because the government is irresponsible or careless, or because it is compromised.

  Wangari Maathai

  Gmos, Government, Trying

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• First of all, farmers should work with universities and research institutions in the country, and hopefully with the government.

  Wangari Maathai

  Country, Government, Research

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• One of the reasons why I've written The Challenge for Africa is to save it. Surely there are so many problems we can solve in Africa, but first and foremost, we need a government that feels responsible to protect their own people from the exploitations, from the misuse, from the mistreatment that they can easily get.

  Wangari Maathai

  Government, People, Challenges

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• As a scientist I cannot say we don't want to hear anything about GMOs, because these are advances in science. But I think its also important, especially when you are dealing with food, to be cautious.

  Wangari Maathai

  Thinking, Gmos, Important

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• I think [GMO] is one area where the is a need for legal regulations to make sure that companies - because at the moment, companies are the ones that have this technology - will not use this technology in a way that could adversely affect the people.

  Wangari Maathai

  Technology, Thinking, Gmos

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• So GMOs, who knows? Maybe GMOs will come, they will get maize that produces double. But who knows what else may happen to the maize?

  Wangari Maathai

  Gmos, May, Produce

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• I think some of these solutions are prepared in an office without a full understanding of the local situation.

  Wangari Maathai

  Thinking, Office, Understanding

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• Nile perch is a fish that was introduced into Lake Victoria. The reason that fish was introduced into Lake Victoria was because it was decided that the people living near the lake needed more proteins than they were getting.

  Wangari Maathai

  Lakes, People, Reason

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• Now when Nile perch was introduced [into Lake Victoria], I don't think enough research was done; maybe it was done, maybe it was not. But Nile perch is a huge fish. So it ate all the little fish, and it grew into a monster which the local people could not fish with their little boats and their little nets.

  Wangari Maathai

  Thinking, Lakes, People

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• An individual citizen cannot protect himself from the powers of large corporations or external governments. It is the responsibility of the government to protect its citizens.

  Wangari Maathai

  Responsibility, Government, Citizens

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• There are certain areas where foreign investors can help the local people to generate wealth, and improve their quality of life. Some companies, for example, Del Monte, which produces pineapples in Kenya, pay a huge amount of taxes, I am sure, to the Kenyan government, and they do create jobs for thousands of locals.

  Wangari Maathai

  Jobs, Government, People

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• I'm sure the government of Qatar is not coming in to grow food for the people of Kenya; it's coming to grow food to sell. If it can also sell to the people of Kenya, well, then good. I think that the moves can be helpful, but I think that the history that Africa knows, as I say in my book, has been a history of exploitation.

  Wangari Maathai

  Moving, Book, Thinking

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• The American government has spent a lot of money trying to reclaim, for example, the Everglades, and to allow the natural vegetation at the coastal areas to be restored because that was part of the vegetation that actually protected the hinterlands.

  Wangari Maathai

  Government, Trying, Example

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• After Hurricane Katrina, many people said that the levees were not as effective as the natural vegetation that had been removed at the coast. So that means as we develop these seaside land masses, we need to have enough knowledge to not regret in the future. We know that the US government is literally buying these lands back to allow them to be rehabilitated.

  Wangari Maathai

  Regret, Mean, Land

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• The government of Qatar, as I mentioned, has proposed to come and lease Kenya's Tana River delta in order to farm there. What I am not sure of is, has an environmental impact assessment been made to ensure that exploiting this delta for agricultural activities is the best way we can use the delta?We must be concerned about the long-term impact of agricultural activities in the delta.

  Wangari Maathai

  Order, Qatar, Rivers

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• Education of course is a very empowering experience, so many people who went to school also managed to improve their quality of life much faster because they could get a job, they could get money, and with money you could buy things that you cannot buy if you don't have money.

  Wangari Maathai

  Jobs, School, People

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• Once people see that you improve you life if you are educated, then education becomes a valuable tool and people want it.

  Wangari Maathai

  People, Want, Tools

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• People are dynamic. They change, and soon as there are enough of you, things change [for a whole society].

  Wangari Maathai

  People, Things Change, Enough

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• I have seen a lot of men, for example, who will make a will and include their daughters whether they are married or not. And perhaps the greatest change of attitude is that today, at least in Kenya, if you don't send your child to school - unless it's a matter of poverty or religion, and it is not that there no schools - then people wonder, "why the hell don't you send your children to school?" Now that's a very big jump from when I was going to school and educating girls was an exception to the rule.

  Wangari Maathai

  Girl, Daughter, Attitude

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• Tradition sometimes excludes the girl child from inheriting; or single women may not want to be perceived as pursuing too much property. The law has come a long way in favor of the woman, but it is the tradition, the attitudes, that we often have to fight.

  Wangari Maathai

  Girl, Attitude, Children

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• The issue of carbon is one area where we really need to work together and if people don't have the technology they need, that technology needs to be made available and affordable.

  Wangari Maathai

  Technology, Issues, People

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com

• One of the reasons why I say we all need to work together to save the Congo forest, because if we don't save the Congo forest, the Amazon forest and the southeast Asia forest, if those forests release the carbon they are trapping at the moment, much of what you will be doing in the North will be negated by the amount of carbon released into the atmosphere.

  Wangari Maathai

  Atmosphere, Together, Asia

  Source: kenvironews.wordpress.com