Activists who blocked fossil fuel development, protected vulnerable ecosystems, and helped enact clean air regulations are among the seven winners of this year's prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize.
The San Francisco-based Goldman Environmental Foundation announced Monday that the winners of the 35th annual Goldman Prize—which some call the "Green Nobels"—are:
- Marcel Gomes, Brazil: Gomes, a journalist , worked with colleagues at Repórter Brasil to coordinate "a complex, international campaign that directly linked beef from JBS,
the world's largest meatpacking company, to illegal deforestation in
Brazil's most threatened ecosystems."
- Murrawah Maroochy Johnson, Australia: Maroochy Johnson, a Wirdi woman from the Birri Gubba Nation, "blocked development of the Waratah coal mine," a "carbon bomb" that "would have
accelerated climate change in Queensland, destroyed the nearly
20,000-acre Bimblebox Nature Refuge, added 1.58 billion tons of CO2 to
the atmosphere over its lifetime, and threatened Indigenous rights and
culture."
- Alok Shukla, India: Shukla "led a successful community campaign that saved 445,000 acres of
biodiversity-rich forests from 21 planned coal mines in the central
Indian state of Chhattisgarh."
- Andrea Vidaurre, United States: Vidaurre's "grassroots leadership persuaded the California Air
Resources Board to adopt, in the spring of 2023, two historic
transportation regulations that significantly limit trucking and rail
emissions."
- Sinegugu Zukulu and Nonhle Mbuthuma, South Africa: Zukulu and Mbuthuma "stopped destructive seismic testing for oil and gas off South Africa's
Eastern Cape" by "asserting the
rights of the local community to protect their marine environment," safeguarding "migratory whales, dolphins, and other wildlife from the
harmful effects of seismic testing."
- Teresa Vicente, Spain: Vicente "led a historic, grassroots campaign to save the Mar Menor
ecosystem—Europe's largest saltwater lagoon—from collapse, resulting in
the passage of a new law in September 2022 granting the lagoon unique
legal rights."
Michael Sutton, executive director of the Goldman Environmental Foundation,
described the winners to
The Associated Press as "an incredible group of individuals laboring, sometimes in obscurity, against overwhelming odds to prevail against governments, against industry."
Goldman Prize winners receive a $200,000 award and can apply for additional grants to fund their work.
Reacting to his win, Gomes
said: "This award recognizes the impact that journalism can have to protect the environment and ultimately improve people's lives.Repórter Brasil was able to track the Brazilian meat chain from the farm to supermarkets abroad, which companies said was not possible to do."
Vicente
told the AP that the prize "signifies an international recognition that we are facing a new stage in humanity," one in which "human beings understand they are part of nature."
Shukla toldThe New York Times that he hopes his award will inspire frontline communities around the world.
"There is a way," he said, "that local communities can actually resist even the most powerful corporations using just their resolve and peaceful, democratic means."
