Green Belt Movement

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Green Belt Movement
(GBM)
founding 1977
founder Wangari Maathai
Seat Nairobi , Kenya
main emphasis environmental Protection
people Pauline Kamau (Executive Director GBM Kenya)
Stephen Mills (Director GBM USA)
Francesca de Gasparis (Director GBM Europe)
Employees 146 (2011)
Website www.greenbeltmovement.org

The grassroots movement The Green Belt Movement ( GBM ; German  The Green Belt Movement ) is an international non-governmental organization , which primarily on environmental concentrated and the development of social communities. It was founded in 1977 by the Kenyan Wangari Maathai .

In the first decades of its existence, the movement carried out tree-planting campaigns to counter deforestation and thus also soil erosion in Kenya and to ensure the availability of wood, the main source of energy for cooking. Activities also focus on developing an environmentally conscious approach to nature. Since 1977 the GBM has planted over 30 million trees and trained over 30,000 women in forestry , beekeeping , food processing and other ways of securing income. Maathai also established the movement for the empowerment of women in society, ecotourism and economic development. In 2004 she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her work in the green belt movement .

Basic problem

The deforestation that the Green Belt Movement is fighting creates a variety of problems. The lack of trees leads to soil erosion , which leads to desertification . This makes the cultivation of fruit and vegetables very complex or even impossible. The large-scale deforestation also causes a shortage of firewood. The compulsion to save firewood leads to an increase in malnutrition , as the people affected very often do not use the stove and do not cook. This means that staple foods such as cassava , yams and sweet potatoes are removed from the menu as they cannot be eaten raw. Due to the lack of reforestation, the women in the villages are forced to cover more and more time-consuming trips to get firewood for the family. The deforestation of the forests without replacement is also putting great pressure on the animal world, whose habitat is becoming ever smaller. Deforestation also has a negative impact on the amount of rain: the cool air that rises from a forest collides with warm air masses. This creates regular rains. The radical deforestation leads to fewer trees, less cool air and therefore less rain overall. The resulting drought, in turn, favors desertification and leads to crop failures.

history

Before founding the Green Belt Movement

Wangari Maathai, the initiator of the Green Belt Movement

In the 1920s, the British forest scientists founded Richard St. Barbe Baker the "Men of the Trees" (with the support of the African Chiefs Josiah Njonjo in central Kenya German  men of trees , today, " International Tree Foundation "), a community later international reforestation Kenya. However, the movement was forgotten in Kenya after Njonjo's death. After the founding of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) in 1972 and the establishment of the UNEP headquarters in Nairobi , several European non-governmental organizations (NGOs) got involved in Nairobi to monitor the implementation of the agreements made. To this end, the Environment Liaison Center (today: Environment Liaison Center International (ELCI) ) was established, which Wangari Maathai joined and became chairman of a few years later. In 1974 the Environment Liaison Center was recognized by UNEP and Maathai opened a first, small tree nursery in Karura Forest . This was mainly used, also to the election campaign of her husband, the Parliament sabgeordneten Mwangi Maathai, promised jobs in the constituency Lang'ata to create. A short time later, Maathai founded Envirocare Ltd. , a company whose main activities were cleaning and clearing Lang'ata and planting trees. The company, which was based in Maathai's home, was not a great success. In 1976, during a drought in which the city of Nairobi banned watering of flowers and trees, all of the saplings in the nursery died.

Foundation of the movement and first actions

In 1977 Maathai gave a lecture on her concern at the National Council of Women in Kenya ( Maendeleo Ya Wanawake ). A few months later, Maathai became a member of the women's council's environmental commission and proposed a reforestation campaign at a meeting. After initial hesitation, the decision was made for the project that was called Save the Land - Harambee ( German  Save the Land - let's pull together ). The aim was to get the Kenyan women to actively participate in afforestation and reforestation and thus counter the impending desertification .

The first planting ceremony took place in June 1977, on World Environment Day , in Nairobi. The participants first walked from the Kenyatta International Conference Center to Kamukunji Park, outside the city, and planted seven trees there. The next tree-planting campaign in Naivasha followed in September on the occasion of the United Nations desert conference, with the participation of Richard St. Barbe Baker . The campaign aroused great media interest and was quickly expanded, so that the Women's Council was soon unable to meet the demand for tree seedlings. The aim was to plant 15 million trees, which corresponded to the population of Kenya at that time. The motto was accordingly “One tree per person”. When it became more and more difficult for the women's council to grow the tree saplings themselves in the required number, and procurement from state tree nurseries was complicated and expensive, women's groups began to be motivated to establish their own tree nurseries. Save the Land - Harambee held seminars with forest scientists to teach interested women the basics of forestry. Soon, however, the participation of the experts was dispensed with and methods of growing vegetables and cereals were transferred to arboriculture. The interested women showed a lot of initiative and inventiveness. The movement, now known as the Green Belt Movement , grew rapidly. Meanwhile, many rural municipal administrations have shown great interest in the tree-planting campaigns. Local tree-planting strategies have been developed and green belts of more than 1,000 trees have been created on public land. The fact that the seedlings were still given out free of charge and did not burden the empty coffers of the municipal administrations contributed to the success of the municipal administrations .

Success and expansion

In October 2011, the Kenyan ambassador to Germany, Ken Osinde , planted a tree in honor of Wangari Maathai in the garden of the Heinrich Böll Foundation's office in Berlin.

By 1990 the Green Belt Movement had planted more than 39,000 members and more than seven million trees. In 2002 the number of members had grown to more than one million, eight years later the GBM's annual report reported that almost 47 million trees had been planted in Kenya since 1977.

In 1986 the Pan African Green Belt Movement was founded. The green belt movement is now active in 13 African countries, including Tanzania , Uganda , Malawi , Lesotho , Ethiopia and Zimbabwe , and has planted more than 30 million trees.

The Green Belt Movement has also been working with the Kenyan armed forces since 2004 and is also involved in prisons. The Kenyan armed forces take part in tree-planting campaigns, in the prisons, among other things, the inner courtyards are planted together with the prisoners. In 2006, Maathai and Albert von Monaco took over the patronage of the UNEP's One Billion Trees Campaign . The campaign is considered a great success. By the end of 2009, over 7.4 billion trees had been planted in 170 countries, and in April 2012 the UNEP reported 12.5 billion plantings worldwide.

In its 2011 annual report, the Green Belt Movement reported 4,034 local tree nurseries and 3.9 million trees planted, out of a total of more than 51 million plantings since the movement was founded.

The Green Belt Movement has been a partner in the African Forest Landscape Restoration Initiative since the end of 2015 , which aims to reforest an area of ​​100 million hectares in Africa by 2030.

aims

Building sustainable fuelwood resources and preventing malnutrition

The Green Belt Movement advocates the planting of various types of trees in the immediate vicinity of the residential areas and promotes the cultivation of fruit trees in order to ensure that families have an energy-saving and vitamin-rich diet. In addition to firewood, trees also provide fertilizing leaves, honey and raw materials for building houses, for fences and consumer goods. Furthermore, courses on ecological and sustainable agriculture , crop rotation and agricultural techniques are held and these are demonstrated in experimental gardens. The smallholder women should acquire the necessary knowledge to produce the food needs of their household themselves and thus to achieve food security for their families.

Improving household income and promoting self-determination

In order to improve the income of the women who worked in tree nurseries and gave agricultural training courses for other women, GBM bought all of the saplings that were not yet planted that were older than three months from the women's groups. In this way, the women earned an extra income and at the same time benefited from the growing fuelwood resources. The movement assigns management tasks to members of the tree nurseries and transfers responsibility for documentation, bookkeeping , organizing meetings and running the tree nurseries to local women. The skills they have learned in this way can later be used in other areas and, for example, take on administrative or management tasks in their community.

Promoting environmental awareness and combating soil erosion

In order to sensitize the next generation of Kenyans to the topics of the Green Belt Movement, the movement founds tree nurseries in public schools and teaches students about environmental protection topics. The pupils are motivated to participate in the tree planting activities. In addition, seminars and conferences are held for all interested parties, in which the connections between deforestation and hunger, malnutrition, poverty, soil erosion , the sinking of the groundwater level and the associated lack of drinking water are explained. The fight against soil erosion is the subject of further seminars in which the Green Belt Movement explains cost-effective measures to avoid the erosion of soils by wind or water. For example, the GBM provides guidance on the selection of the right tree species and explains the creation of wind protection strips and terraces and the construction of drainage systems .

Political education

Lectures and seminars on political education are held at the headquarters of the Green Belt Movement in Nairobi and in the villages. Speakers speak about the government of Kenya, environmental policy and the ongoing environmental degradation caused by mismanagement of national resources. Further topics are culture and spirituality , the development crisis in Africa and the resulting problems of overpopulation, unemployment and poverty. The Green Belt Movement also organizes and hosts seminars on human rights , with a focus on women's rights . The participants should learn to exercise their right to self-determination and self- realization, not to let family planning be determined by others, to recognize exploitation and oppression and to defend themselves against them.

activities

The liver sausage tree is one of the tree species most commonly planted by the GBM.

Plantings

When selecting trees, the green belt movement pays attention to their greatest possible benefit for the population. Among the most frequently planted trees include liver sausage trees , olive trees , Cordia africana and tamarind trees . So far, the plantings have taken place in the districts of Kwale , Meru Central , Trans-Nzoia , Nakuru , Nyeri , Bungoma , Uasin Gishu and around and in Nairobi . In 2006 GBM partnered with Agence française de développement to reforest 4,000 hectares of forest in the Aberdare Range . The French government paid 1.3 million euros for this.

Training

Green Belt Movement employees conduct training courses on the subjects of food production, nutrition and water supply at community level. Particular attention is given to local crops and their cultivation, cultivation and preparation. Beekeeping courses are also offered. Crops promoted by GBM include cassava , yams , sweet potatoes and peanuts , lima beans , sorghum , sesame seeds and bananas . In the seminars on the topic of water supply, topics such as dam construction , mulching , drainage , field forestry and the cultivation of ground cover are taught. These techniques are designed to reduce surface evaporation so that more water can seep into the soil.

GBM also provides garden tools, fence building materials, water tanks, pipes and fertilizer . This supplements the inventory of aids available in the community. By lending aids and tools to one another, not only group members benefit, but the entire community.

Political commitment

In the late 1980s, the members of the GBM began to take active action against violations of environmental and human rights. In 1989 Maathai and her colleagues succeeded in preventing the construction of a 62-story building in Uhuru Park in Nairobi. In 1992, members of the GBM supported the mothers of political prisoners in demonstrations for the release of their children. As part of the Erlassjahr.de campaign for debt relief in developing countries, the Green Belt movement gave seminars on debt relief and called on the clergy to support the campaign.

In the fight against corruption , the GBM has always focused on public land and open spaces that have been illegally sold by the government to private companies. Saving the Kararu Forest, the Kafiru-ini Forest and the forests on Mount Kenya was a great success for the movement. As part of the movement, Maathai campaigned for sustainable economic activity, for democracy and human rights, women's rights in particular, for education, nutrition and family planning.

GBM has published several reports on global warming that may include a. have been presented at various UN climate conferences .

Organization and financing

In 1999 there were four departments: project management , administration , finance and coordination.

In project management, new tree planting projects were supervised by a project worker who, together with regional supervisors and the responsible nursery group, organized and carried out the tree planting. The nursery groups employed so-called promoters who advertised the goals of the GBM. If interested, the promoters referred to the local consultant who helped set up a new tree nursery. So-called tree nursery supervisors were hired for the daily work in a tree nursery. The administration comprised the board, executive committee and secretariat. The staff were responsible for managing the main office and projects. The administration also took care of contact with communities and donors. The finance department was responsible for the money and property administration and prepared the annual audit reports. The employees in the coordination department took care of, among other things, maintaining international contacts, personnel administration and the development of new projects.

In the peak phase, GBM employed around 2,600 people, mostly women part-time. In 2004 there were 40 full-time employees and 100,000 fellow campaigners across Kenya. Green Belt Movement has offices in Washington, DC and London . In 2012 the movement had 140 employees in Kenya, five in Washington and another four in the European office in London.

The organization was financed mainly through donations, for example through donations from aid organizations in Scandinavia, the Netherlands and the USA, as well as through funds from the United Nations . In order to become more independent of donations, the ecotourism provider Green Belt Safaris was founded in order to secure an income for the movement. Green Belt Safaris offers study trips, project visits, day seminars, cultural trips and the opportunity to work on one of the tree planting projects.

After Wangari Maathai's death in September 2011, Pauline Kamau took over the leadership of the Green Belt Movement as Executive Director.

Awards

Wangari Maathai received the Right Livelihood Award , also known as the Alternative Nobel Prize, in 1984 for her work with GBM , the Global 500 Award in 1987 and the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004 . 2006 Maathai was in the French Legion of Honor received, in 2009 she received the Order of the Rising Sun .

reception

In addition to the documentaries The Naked Earth from 1985, Women at Work from 1986 and The Green Belt Movement - Kenya from 1999, there is the French documentary Taking Root by Lisa Merton and Alan Dater, made in 2008 . In 2008, Taking Root won awards at the Durban International Film Festival , the Vermont International Film Festival and the Asheville International Film Festival , among others . There are also various children's books that deal with the idea of ​​the Green Belt movement and its founder, such as a book published by Jeannette Winter entitled Wangari's Trees of Peace: A True Story from Africa . Mama Miti: Wangari Maathai and the Trees of Kenya was published by the children's book author Donna Jo Napoli in 2010 .

literature

  • Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Approach and experience. ("The Green Belt Movement"). Ennsthaler, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 37.
  2. ↑ Ilona Eveleens: Kenya's green lungs take a deep breath , article in the taz of November 14, 2009, accessed on May 6, 2012.
  3. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 23.
  4. ↑ manofthetrees.org ( Memento of July 13, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
  5. ^ Entry on the Environment Liaison Center International at unep.org, accessed on March 10, 2010.
  6. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 29.
  7. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 33.
  8. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 43.
  9. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 45.
  10. ^ The power of environmentalism. ( Memento of May 28, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) on the homepage of the University at Buffalo, The State University of New York , accessed on March 11, 2010.
  11. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , pp. 46-48.
  12. ↑ a b Insect in the brain. In: Der Spiegel . 6/1990 of February 5, 1990, accessed March 11, 2010.
  13. ↑ a b People and Visions: Wangari Maathai , article on eco-world.de, accessed on March 11, 2010.
  14. ↑ Annual Report Green Belt Movement 2010 ( Memento of the original from August 13, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (pdf) on the website greenbeltmovement.org, accessed on November 20, 2012.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.greenbeltmovement.org
  15. ↑ Dagmar Vinz: Sustainability and Gender - Environmental Policy from the Perspective of Gender Studies. ( Memento from January 31, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) (pdf; 335 kB), accessed on March 11, 2010.
  16. ↑ Maathai's biography on nobelprize.org, accessed on March 11, 2010.
  17. ↑ Planting with institutions ( Memento of February 3, 2011 in the Internet Archive ), greenbeltmovement.org.
  18. ^ Billion Tree Campaign on the UNEP homepage , accessed on March 11, 2010.
  19. ↑ Current figures on the Billion Tree Campaign website ( memento of April 21, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on April 19, 2012 at www.plant-for-the-planet-billiontreecampaign.org.
  20. ↑ Annual Report 2011 ( Memento of October 28, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), greenbeltmovement.org (PDF), accessed on November 16, 2012.
  21. ↑ RELEASE: African Countries Launch AFR100 to Restore 100 Million Hectares of Land , AFR100.org, December 5th, 2015
  22. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 56.
  23. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , pp. 62-65.
  24. ↑ a b Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 57.
  25. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 58.
  26. ↑ a b Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 60.
  27. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , pp. 68-70.
  28. ↑ Annual Report Green Belt Movement 2003 ( Memento of the original from May 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (pdf), accessed on March 11, 2010.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.greenbeltmovement.org
  29. ↑ Wangari Maathai Receives France's Highest Honor ( Memento of February 3, 2011 in the Internet Archive ), greenbeltmovement.org.
  30. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , pp. 66-67.
  31. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 144.
  32. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 95.
  33. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 71.
  34. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 72.
  35. ^ Reason for the Nobel Prize Committee on handelsblatt.com, accessed on March 11, 2010.
  36. ↑ GBM: Annual Reports , accessed November 17, 2013.
  37. ^ GBM: Responding to Climate Change from the Grassroots: The Green Belt Movement Approach. Report 2009 ( (PDF) , accessed on November 17, 2013)
  38. ↑ GBM: Rethinking Support for Adaptive Capacity to Climate Change. Report 2011 ( PDF ( Memento of the original on 5 June 2012 at the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link is automatically inserted and not yet tested Please review the original and archive link under. Instructions and then remove this notice. , Accessed on November 17, 2013 ) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / community.eldis.org
  39. ^ GBM: The Green Belt Movement Community Forest Climate Initiatives. Report, December 2, 2011 ( PDF ( Memento of the original from February 7, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this note. , Accessed on November 17, 2013) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.greenbeltmovement.org
  40. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , pp. 78-79.
  41. ↑ Wangari Maathai: The Green Belt Movement. Ennsthaler Verlag, Steyr 2008, ISBN 978-3-85068-700-3 , p. 88.
  42. ↑ Trees as ambassadors. Interview by zenith magazine from July 2004 with Wangari Maathai, accessed on spiegel.de on March 11, 2010.
  43. ↑ greenbeltmovement.org , accessed November 20, 2012.
  44. ↑ Our staff and board. greenbeltmovement.org, accessed November 16, 2012.
  45. ↑ Staff - US , greenbeltmovement.org, accessed on 16 November 2012 found.
  46. ↑ Staff - Europe , greenbeltmovement.org, accessed on 16 November 2012 found.
  47. ↑ Green Belt Safaris on greenbeltmovement.org, accessed on 20 November 2012 found.
  48. ↑ Who we are , greenbeltmovement.org, accessed November 16, 2012.
  49. ↑ takingrootfilm.com , accessed on 20 November 2012 found.
  50. ^ Jeannette Winter: Wangari's Trees of Peace: A True Story from Africa. Harcourt Brace & Co, 2008, ISBN 978-0-15-206545-4 .
  51. ↑ Donna Jo Napoli : Mama Miti: Wangari Maathai and the Trees of Kenya. Simon & Schuster / Paula Wiseman Books, ISBN 1-4169-3505-3 .
This version was added to the list of articles worth reading on May 19, 2012 .