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PRESS RELEASE: TWO U.S. WOMEN – LAST HOPE FOR THE WORLD’S OLDEST TROPICAL RAINFOREST
SANTA FE, NM, January 10, 2005 --/WORLD-WIRE/-- Two U.S. women stand between destruction and the world's oldest tropical rainforest. An author-adventurer, and a foundation program director, fight for the Daintree Rainforest of Queensland, Australia.
Two United States women and one of Australia’s award winning scientists might be all that stand in the way of the destruction of the oldest tropical rainforest on earth and the Great Barrier Reef. Robin Easton, Julie Tessler and Dr. Hugh Spencer are fighting to save the Daintree Rainforest of Queensland, Australia, home to a vast range of rare and threatened plants and animals.
Lend Lease, a heavily funded resort developer, has laid plans for shopping malls and is lobbying for roads, bridges and power lines, imperiling the Daintree. “The sharks are circling our rainforest; we’re the last hope for this prehistoric place,” said Tessler, US Fund Advisor for the Daintree Rainforest Land Trust (DRLT). The DRLT intends to buyback the rainforest for conservation, and recently received a generous gift from the Sierra Club Foundation in support of its efforts. www.daintreelandtrust.org
“Tropical rainforests contain at least two thirds of all terrestrial (land) species. Since 1950, we have destroyed half of these lush forests; we can’t afford to lose anymore,” said Easton. “The biodiversity of the planet will be irreversibly altered by the loss of the ancient Daintree rainforest.”
A remarkable set of coincidences brought the three together. Easton, an author, was writing her book, "Naked in Eden", when she contacted Dr. Spencer, who has conducted research in the rainforest for 15 years. Spencer read Easton’s, account of leaving the U.S. to travel to Australia with her Aussie husband to live in Far North Queensland wiith poisonous snakes, crocodiles and ancient trees in the untamed Daintree Rainforest.
“It’s un-put-downable,” he said. "The opportunity Robin had to enter a timeless state, and then write about it, is given to very few. She sure didn’t waste the opportunity. This is the book to galvanize people to protect and save the Daintree.” He readily wrote the forward to "Naked in Eden: Ancient Memories in the Australian Rainforest."
In 2002, Tessler left her successful life as a corporate headhunter to travel the world, searching for a career she could “be passionate about”. After seven months abroad she found Dr. Hugh Spencer at the Cape Tribulation Tropical Research Station and was thrilled with his “do-or-die” stand for the Daintree. She returned to the U.S. with a mission – to start an international campaign to preserve the Daintree through land buyback.
From halfway around the world, Spencer, winner of The Australian Science Communicators “Unsung Hero of Australian Science Award”, put the two women in contact.
“The multinational has a toehold,” said Tessler, “This is a race to consolidate land so Dr. Spencer and local organizations have the clout to fight. Time is drawing down, we have to help and we have to do it fast.”
CONTACT:
Julie L. Tessler
Program Director
Daintree Rainforest Land Trust
280 Madison Avenue Suite 912
New York, New York 10016
T telephone: 212-355-6988
julie@drltrust.org
http://www.drltrust.org/
Robin Easton
robin@nakedineden.com
http://www.nakedineden.com
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