By UN Environment
Molly Burhans, Founder of GoodLands, has won the Young Champions of the Earth Prize for pioneering digital mapping and bringing big data for restoration to the world’s largest landowners.
As world leaders gather at the UN Headquarters in New York for the Climate Action Summit and General Assembly in the coming days, climate and the environment will be at the forefront of discussions. Youth around the world are already taking action because there is no time to lose.
As chief cartographer of the first data-based global maps of the Catholic Church, Burhans discovered that large tracts of their land remain digitally unmapped. Yet, globally, faith-based organizations own 8 percent of habitable land on earth’s surface and 5 percent of all commercial forest. There are 37 million churches and 3.6 million mosques around the world.
Since the church already has the world’s largest non-governmental global healthcare network, Burhans decided to leverage its land asset data to create the world’s largest network for environmental protection.
She led a mapping team to make the first digital maps illuminating the Catholic Church’s global infrastructure. Now she plans to help other major landowners leverage restoration potential through asset management.
“If a picture is worth a thousand words, a map is worth a million,” said Burhans. “Our vision is to create the largest network for restoration in the world. We are digitally mapping the world’s biggest landowners, encouraging environmental stewardship.” Read more.
