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Women are responsible for their children, they cannot sit back, waste time and see them starve.

Wangari Maathai

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Wangari Maathai
Age: 71 †
Born: 1940
Born: April 1
Died: 2011
Died: September 25
Biologist
Environmentalist
Political Activist
Politician
Teacher
Veterinarian
Wangari Maathaï
Maathai
Wangari Maathai
Cannot
Women
Back
Children
Time
Starve
Responsible
Waste

More quotes by Wangari Maathai

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You cannot blame the mismanagement of the economy or the fact that we have not invested adequately in education in order to give our people the knowledge, the skills and the technology that they need in order to be able to use the resources that Africa has to gain wealth
Wangari Maathai
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The living conditions of the poor must be improved if we really want to save our environment
Wangari Maathai
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As long as there is no trust and confidence that there will be justice and fairness in resource distribution, political positioning will remain more important than service
Wangari Maathai
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I definitely hope to relax when I get back hope. I will disappear into the forest and be rejuvenated by the beauty of the mountains.
Wangari Maathai
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All of us have a God in us, and that God is the spirit that unites all life, everything that is on this planet.
Wangari Maathai
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You can educate people on how to preempt their own conflict.
Wangari Maathai
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Anybody can dig a hole and plant a tree. But make sure it survives. You have to nurture it, you have to water it, you have to keep at it until it becomes rooted so it can take care or itself. There are so many enemies of trees.
Wangari Maathai
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What a friend we have in a tree, the tree is the symbol of hope, self improvement and what people can do for themselves.
Wangari Maathai
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When resources are degraded, we start competing for them, whether it is at the local level in Kenya, where we had tribal clashes over land and water, or at the global level, where we are fighting over water, oil, and minerals. So one way to promote peace is to promote sustainable management and equitable distribution of resources.
Wangari Maathai
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Quite often when you help poor people, they don't think about the environment. They think about survival.
Wangari Maathai
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First of all, farmers should work with universities and research institutions in the country, and hopefully with the government.
Wangari Maathai
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Resources on the planet are limited, and limited resources can come to an end. But there are also a lot of resources that are renewable. A lot of land, for example, can be reclaimed from the encroaching deserts.
Wangari Maathai
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What people see as fearlessness is really persistence. Because I am focused on the solution, I don't see the danger.
Wangari Maathai
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But when you have bad governance, of course, these resources are destroyed: The forests are deforested, there is illegal logging, there is soil erosion. I got pulled deeper and deeper and saw how these issues become linked to governance, to corruption, to dictatorship.
Wangari Maathai
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Sometimes we become bound by other people's thoughts because we are not sure about ourselves.
Wangari Maathai
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No matter who or where we are, or what our capabilities, we are called to do the best we can.
Wangari Maathai
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We tend to put the environment last because we think the first thing we have to do is eliminate poverty. But you can't reduce poverty in a vacuum. You are doing it in an environment.
Wangari Maathai
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The women of the Green Belt Movement have learned about the causes and the symptoms of environmental degradation. They have begun to appreciate that they, rather than their government, ought to be the custodians of the environment.
Wangari Maathai
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It was easy for me to be ridiculed and for both men and women to perceive that maybe I'm a bit crazy because I'm educated in the West and I have lost some of my basic decency as an African woman.
Wangari Maathai
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When people can't use you, they ridicule what you represent. I was lucky that I understood that, because when one does not understand that, it is very easy to be broken and to be subdued.
Wangari Maathai