After her corporate career as CEO of Patagonia outdoor clothing and gear, Kristine Tompkins and her late husband, Douglas Tompkins, creator of North Face brand clothing, have both gifted and facilitated the preservation of 14.7 million acres of land as national parks in the Patagonia region of Argentina and Chile.

In a recent Ted Talk Tompkins describes her activism and says the Earth needs “re-wilding” to provide the natural services we all depend on. We can’t expect to use the earth for endless extraction, but rather view the Earth as a partner, she says.

Tompkins’ influences came early in her life. One big influence was the selling and subdivision of her grandparents farm where she grew up. 

“I came to understand that something valuable can be best understood, not by its presence, but by its absence,” says Thompson in a recent Ted Talk.

At THI we have been encouraged, as Tompkins also describes, by the monumental shift in global behavior demonstrated during the Corona virus outbreak.  The quick global response to the threat of a virus proves that governments and citizens can act quickly when we realize we’re all in this together.

“The first step in re-wilding is to be able to imagine that it’s possible in the first place.  I know it’s possible because I’ve seen it,” she says.

View Kristine Tompkins’ Ted Talk here.
https://www.ted.com/talks/kristine_tompkins_let_s_make_the_world_wild_again?utm_source=tedcomshare&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=tedspread#t-901606