Greta Thunberg in a photograph taken in Geneva, Switzerland on August 8, 2019.
FABRICE COFFRINI | AFP | fake pictures
Climate activist Greta Thunberg plans to donate a € 1 million ($ 1.14 million) award to organizations focused on the environment and climate change.
The 17-year-old Swede was named winner of the inaugural Gulbenkian Humanity Prize on Monday. In a video, she described herself as “incredibly honest and extremely grateful … this means a lot to me and I hope it will help me do more good in the world.”
“All the prize money will be donated through my foundation to different organizations and projects that are working to help people on the front lines affected by the climate crisis and the ecological crisis, especially in the Global South,” he continued.
He added that the money would also “help organizations and projects that fight for a sustainable world and that fight to defend nature and the natural world.”
Breaking down the initial donations, Thunberg tweeted that € 100,000 would be donated to the “SOS Amazonia Campaign led by Fridays For Future Brazil to tackle Covid-19 in the Amazon”. Another 100,000 euros will go to the Stop Ecocide Foundation.
The Gulbenkian Prize for Humanity says that “it aims to recognize people, groups of people and / or organizations from around the world whose contributions to climate change mitigation and adaptation stand out for their novelty, innovation and impact.”
The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, based in Portugal, was created in the 1950s after the death of Calouste Sarkis Gulbenkian, a wealthy businessman and philanthropist with an interest in oil.
Since he began a protest outside the Swedish parliament in 2018, Thunberg has reached a prominent place worldwide, becoming the figurehead of a series of school strikes by children around the world.
This is not the first time that he has donated prize money to organizations and causes that he supports. In April, after winning the Human Act Award, she said she would donate the $ 100,000 award to UNICEF. The Human Law Award coincided with Thunberg’s donation with another $ 100,000.
River pollution
Thunberg’s donation came the same week as research by Royal Holloway, the Zoological Society of London and the Museum of Natural History painted a clear picture of how plastic pollution is affecting London’s River Thames.
In an announcement Tuesday, Royal Holloway, which is part of the University of London, said three studies by postgraduates from its department of biological sciences had shown that microplastics were “present in large quantities throughout the Thames and are being ingested for wildlife. ”
One of the studies estimated that during ebb tides, when water flows out to sea, 94,000 pieces of microplastic moved through parts of the river every second, while another found that about 95% of crabs examined had “plastic tangled “in the stomach. . A third analyzed the impact of “non-washable” and “washable” wet wipes.
Taken together, these studies show how many different types of plastic, from microplastics in the water to larger elements of debris that physically alter the shoreline, can potentially affect a wide range of organisms in the River Thames, “Dave Morritt, professor at Royal Holloway said in a statement.
“Increased use of single-use plastic items and improper disposal of such items, including masks and gloves, along with cleaning products containing plastic, during the current Covid-19 pandemic, may exacerbate this problem,” he added. .
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