1. The energy, commitment, and hard work of young people once they understand the problems and are empowered to discuss and ACT upon solutions. Which is why I devote so much time to developing our youth program, Roots & Shoots. This is for young people from pre-school through University. Roots and Shoots is now in 137 countries. Each group chooses three projects: to improve things for people, other animals, and the environment. With a theme running through: let’s learn to live in peace and harmony with each other – with other religions, cultures, and nations. Between young and old, rich and poor, native and immigrant. And let us learn to live in better harmony with nature. There are about 150,000 members around the world and they are truly making a difference. They choose the projects they are passionate about, roll up their sleeves, and take action. And so many adults, who have been Roots and Shoots members, remain committed for life. The human brain. The biggest difference (in my opinion) between us and our closest animal relatives, the chimpanzees, is the human brain. Chimpanzees are much more intelligent than was once thought. But even the brightest chimpanzee brain cannot equal the brain of a creature who designed a rocket from which crept a robot that is still crawling around on Mars taking photos for scientists on Earth to study. So the question is: how is it possible that the most intellectual creature to ever walk Planet Earth is destroying its only home? (The photos from Mars make it clear that we can find no suitable home there!) Have we perhaps lost wisdom? When we make a major decision we tend to ask: “How will this benefit me now? Or the next shareholders’s meeting 3 months ahead? Or my next political campaign?” When we should be asking how the decision will affect future generations. But we are coming to our senses. Already, around the world, innovative solutions are being developed to many of the problems we have created, e.g. renewable energy, sustainable farming, and so on. And, as individuals, leaving lighter ecological footprints. 3. The resilience of nature. In the early 1990s the environment around the tiny 30 square miles of Gombe National Park, once part of contiguous forest cover stretching along the eastern shores of Lake Tanganyika, had been reduced to bare hills. There were more people living there than the land could support, too poor to buy food from elsewhere. Over farmed soil had lost its fertility. As I looked down from a small plane I asked myself “How can we even try to save Gombe’s famous chimpanzees when people living around are struggling to survive?” This led to our TACARE (TakeCare) program to improve the lives of the villagers in a holistic way. The most important aspect was that we asked the villagers how they felt we could best help them, and we provided the know-how – i.e. the fish hooks rather than the fish. A key component was micro-credit for groups of mostly women based on the Grameen Bank, loaning money for environmentally sustainable projects, and providing family planning information. We started with 12 villages on the park boundary. It has been so successful, we now operate in 52 villages. And the tree cover is returning, remaining forests are being protected, villagers are taught to use Google Earth tablets to monitor the health of the returning or remaining forests. And they agreed to set village land aside as a buffer around the tiny Gombe park. The chimpanzees have three times more forest today than they did 10 years ago. And other villages are setting aside land to form a corridor that will link the previously isolated Gombe chimpanzees to other remnant groups. And animals on the brink of extinction can be given another chance. I give many inspiring examples in Hope for Animals and their World. My favorite is that of the Black Robin of New Zealand – at one point only seven birds remained, and only one fertile female. She and her mate became famous. There are now more than 500 black robins – all genetically the same but living on four different islands. Hopefully, over time, there will be genetic drift. 4. The indomitable human spirit – the people who tackle seemingly impossible tasks and won’t give up. One such was Don Merton, who saved the black robin, though he was told he was wasting his time. Some are iconic figures – like Nelson Mandela who emerged from 17 years of hard physical labor (21 years in prison) with the amazing capacity of forgiveness so that he led his nation out of the evil regime of apartheid without the bloodbath most people had predicted. In fact we find this indomitable human spirit all round, if we bother to look. And it is very inspiring. 5. My most recent reason for hope is the power of social media. For example, the organizers of the recent climate march in New York expected maybe 100,000. But everyone tweeted and twittered and posted news of it on Facebook, urging their friends and colleagues to join. And there were closer to 400,000 (actually more were joining but the police closed it down). I was one of them!