TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Jane Goodall, an internationally renowned primatologist and conservationist, called on young people to spend more time in nature and warned that conservation is not just for animals but for the environment as a whole during a speech at Taipei University of Science and Technology on Sunday.
Her speech, titled “Inspiring Hope through Action,” drew a packed house of 2,000 attendees, where she shared experiences from her lifelong activism, per CNA.
Goodall recounted both the difficulties and the discoveries she made while studying chimpanzees and noted that although humans have the smartest minds in nature, we are the ones actively destroying the environment.
She urged ordinary people to cultivate a love and passion for the environment, potentially becoming the teachers and parents of the next generation and passing down this message.
Goodall said that if she could run a school, she would let children know that human life is closely related to nature—such as the food they eat and the clothes they wear—and that only by coming into contact with and loving nature can the thought of protecting it grow from their hearts.
She challenged the audience to learn from Indigenous peoples, who have lived in harmony with and respect for nature for thousands of years, and said her mission on earth is to encourage young people to love nature and dare to overcome difficulties in life.
Goodall noted that the world is entering a new era dominated by AI and said AI can be a useful research tool, citing a Spanish research team that used it to identify chimpanzees from camera images.
At 91, she joked that “for my age, the problems and impacts of AI may be limited,” but cautioned that while AI may benefit scientific research, it could also pose future challenges by affecting interpersonal communication.
Following her speech, Goodall visited the Tang Prize Foundation, where Tang Prize Chair Dr. Yin Chung-yao (尹崇堯) and CEO Chern Jenn-chuan (陳振川) and staff hosted a specially prepared vegetarian luncheon honoring her decades-long commitment to vegetarianism.
In 2021, the Jane Goodall Institute and the Tang Prize Foundation signed a memorandum of agreement allocating NT$10 million to support two major conservation initiatives: “Wild Chimpanzee Conservation and Research in Southeast Senegal” and “Conservation Projects of Asia” (2021–2025), per a Tang Foundation press release.
