Goldman Environmental Prize Blog

Sofia Gatica, 2012 Goldman Prize winner and co-founder of the Mothers of Ituzaingo, recently participated in a massive march supporting a lawsuit against Monsanto, a massive agrochemical company whose indiscriminate spraying of toxic pesticides has poisoned thousands of Argentinians. The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, an internationally recognized and much loved human rights group,…

2009 Goldman Prize recipient Maria Gunnoe knows that the coal industry’s main priority is to make a profit, and that exporting coal to fast-growing economies like China is indeed profitable. House Democrats point out that coal exports are on the rise, much of which comes from mountaintop removal coal mining operations in Appalachia. A recently…

After working closely with Prigi Arisandi and the team at ECOTON, the governor of East Java, DR Soekarwo, has agreed to create a new sanctuary zone for native fish on the Surabaya River. Arisandi’s team just concluded a one year research project on the Surabaya, which revealed that the river’s water quality is the healthiest…

The Okapi Wildlife Reserve in the Democratic Republic of Congo covers more than three million acres, and houses 13 primate species, forest elephants, and animals found nowhere else on Earth, including the okapi, a forest giraffe. On June 24th, 2012 a gang of armed poachers launched an attack on the reserve’s headquarters, leaving seven people…

Evgenia Chirikova recently testified before the European Parliament on Vinci’s role in the St. Petersburg-Moscow toll motorway project which threatens to destroy the Khimki forest. Vinci is a French company that Chirikova claims is wrought with corruption and special interests. Chirikova’s team supported their testimony with a graphic photo exhibition documenting the arrest and use…

After finally getting caught up on our inbox and backlog of to-dos, Goldman Prize staff took some time to reflect on our week in Rio. And while we share the many frustrations at the vacuum of government leadership, it’s become clear that the events at Rio Centro did little to undermine the tremendous participation from…

Amid continuing criticism against the outline agreement that came out of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development last week in Rio de Janeiro, a group of civil society leaders have signed on to a statement titled “The Rio+20 We Don’t Want” addressed to the UN and the government delegates at Rio+20. Among the leaders signed…

An alarming new report by Global Witness (an environmental and human rights NGO) reveals that environmental activists are being killed at a rate of one per week. According to an article on The Guardian about the report, last month was one of the deadliest for Filipino activists, while environmental defenders working in the America’s face…

Indigenous groups from around the world, including Japan and the Philippines, gathered yesterday to deliver a resolution to UN delegates at Rio+20. Goldman Prize staff was on site as the groups marched in solidarity to the Rio Center, the official site of the UN summit. A group of leaders representing the various indigenous groups met…