Raven wins environmental prize

In recognition of his outstanding contributions to the protection and management of the world environment, Peter H. Raven, Ph.D., the Engelmann Professor of Botany in the Department of Biology in Arts and Sciences and director of the Missouri Botanical Garden, has received the 1995 Sasakawa Environment Prize from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

Raven was honored at a recent ceremony at the Adam's Mark Hotel in downtown St. Louis. Joanne Fox-Przeworski, director of UNEP's Regional Office for North America, presented Raven with a certificate and $50,000. Raven shares the prize with Norman Myers, Ph.D., an independent environmentalist from the United Kingdom, for their work to investigate, document and analyze the decline of tropical forests and the worldwide loss of biodiversity. Their work has spanned nearly three decades.

The Sasakawa Environment Prize was established in 1984 with an endowment from Ryoichi Sasakawa, founder and chair of the Sasakawa Foundation in Japan. He died in 1995. The prize, which recognizes the work of leading environmentalists around the globe, is considered one of the most prestigious environmental awards in the world.