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Visible from space,
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the Okavango Delta
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is Africa's largest remaining
intact wetland wilderness.
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This shining delta in landlocked Botswana
is the jewel of the Kalahari,
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more valuable than diamonds
to the world's largest diamond producer
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and celebrated in 2014
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as our planet's 1000th
UNESCO World Heritage Site.
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Now, what you see here
are the two major tributaries,
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the Cuito and the Cubango,
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disappearing up north
into the little-known Angolan highlands.
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This is the largest undeveloped
river basin on the planet,
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spanning an area larger than California.
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These vast, undeveloped Angolan
watersheds were frozen in time
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by 27 years of civil war.
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In fact, Africa's largest tank battle
since World War II
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was fought over a bridge
crossing the Okavango's Cuito River.
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There on the right,
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disappearing off into the unknown,
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into the "Terra do fim do mundo" --
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the land at the end of the earth,
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as it was known by the first
Portuguese explorers.
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In 2001, at the age of 22,
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I took a job as head of housekeeping
at Budum Tiki Camp
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in the Okavango Delta ...
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a patchwork mosaic of channels,
floodplains, lagoons
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and thousands upon thousands
of islands to explore.
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Home to the largest remaining
population of elephants on the planet.
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Rhinos are airlifted in C130s
to find sanctuary in this wilderness.
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Lion,
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leopard,
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hyena,
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wild dog,
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cheetah,
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ancient baobab trees
that stand like cathedrals
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under the Milky Way.
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Here, I discovered something obvious:
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wilderness is our natural habitat, too.
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We need these last wild places
to reconnect with who we really are.
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We --
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all seven billion of us --
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must never forget
we are a biological species
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forever bound to this
particular biological world.
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Like the waves connected to the ocean,
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we cannot exist apart from it --
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a constant flow of atoms and energy
between individuals and species
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around the world in a day
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and out into the cosmos.
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Our fates are forever connected
to the millions of species
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we rely on directly
and indirectly every day.
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Four years ago,
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it was declared that 50 percent
of all wildlife around the world
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had disappeared in just 40 years.
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This is a mass drowning
of 15,000 wildebeests
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that I witnessed
in the Maasai Mara two years ago.
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This is definitely our fault.
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By 2020, global wildlife populations
are projected to have fallen
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by a staggering two-thirds.
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We are the sixth extinction
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because we left no safe space
for millions of species
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to sustainably coexist.
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Now, since 2010, I have poled myself
eight times across the Okavango Delta
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to conduct detailed scientific surveys
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along a 200-mile,
18-day research transect.
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Now, why am I doing this?
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Why am I risking my life each year?
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I'm doing this because
we need this information
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to benchmark this near-pristine wilderness
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before upstream development happens.
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These are the Wayeyi river bushmen,
the people of the Okavango Delta.
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They have taught me all I know
about the Mother Okavango --
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about presence in the wild.
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Our shared pilgrimage across
the Okavango Delta each year
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in our mokoros or dugout canoes --
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remembers millenia living in the wild.
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Ten thousand years ago,
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our entire world was wilderness.
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Today, wilderness is all that remains
of that world, now gone.
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Ten thousand years ago,
we were as we are today:
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a modern, dreaming intelligence
unlike anything seen before.
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Living in the wilderness
is what taught us to speak,
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to seek technologies
like fire and stone, bow and arrow,
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medicine and poison,
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to domesticate plants and animals
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and rely on each other
and all living things around us.
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We are these last wildernesses --
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every one of us.
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Over 80 percent
of our planet's land surface
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is now experiencing
measurable human impact:
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habitat destruction
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and illegal wildlife trade are decimating
global wildlife populations.
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We urgently need to create
safe space for these wild animals.
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So in late 2014,
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we launched an ambitious
project to do just that:
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explore and protect.
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By mid-May 2015,
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we had pioneered access
through active minefields
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to the undocumented source lake
of the Cuito River --
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this otherworldly place;
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an ancient, untouched wilderness.
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By the 21st of May,
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we had launched
the Okavango megatransect ...
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in seven dugout canoes;
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1,500 miles, 121 days later,
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all of the poling, paddling
and intensive research
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got us across the entire river basin
to Lake Xau in the Kalahari Desert,
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480 kilometers past the Okavango Delta.
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My entire world became the water:
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every ripple, eddy,
lily pad and current ...
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any sign of danger,
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every sign of life.
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Now imagine millions of sweat bees
choking the air around you,
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flesh-eating bacteria,
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the constant threat
of a landmine going off
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or an unseen hippo capsizing your mokoro.
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These are the scenes
moments after a hippo did just that --
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thrusting its tusks
through the hull of my boat.
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You can see the two holes --
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puncture wounds in the base of the hull --
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absolutely terrifying
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and completely my fault.
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(Laughter)
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Many, many portages,
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tree blockages
and capsizes in rocky rapids.
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You're living on rice and beans,
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bathing in a bucket of cold water
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and paddling a marathon
six to eight hours every single day.
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After 121 days of this,
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I'd forgotten the PIN numbers
to my bank accounts
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and logins for social media --
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a complete systems reboot.
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You ask me now if I miss it,
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and I will tell you I am still there.
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Now why do we need to save
places we hardly ever go?
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Why do we need to save places
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where you have to risk
your life to be there?
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Now, I'm not a religious
or particularly spiritual person,
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but in the wild,
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I believe I've experienced
the birthplace of religion.
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Standing in front of an elephant
far away from anywhere
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is the closest I will ever get to God.
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Moses, Buddha, Muhammad, Jesus,
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the Hindu teachers, prophets and mystics,
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all went into the wilderness --
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up into the mountains, into the desert,
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to sit quietly and listen
for those secrets
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that were to guide
their societies for millennia.
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I go into the Okavango on my mokoro.
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You must join me one day.
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Over 50 percent of the remaining
wilderness is unprotected.
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A huge opportunity --
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a chance for us all.
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We need to act with great urgency.
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Since the 2015 megatransect,
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we have explored all major rivers
of the Okavango River basin,
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covering a life-changing 4,000 miles
of detailed research transects
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on our dugout canoes
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and our fat-tire mountain bikes.
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We now have 57 top scientists
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rediscovering what we call
the Okavango-Zambezi water tower --
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this vast, post-war wilderness
with undocumented source lakes,
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unnamed waterfalls in what is Africa's
largest remaining Miombo woodland.
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We've now discovered
24 new species to science
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and hundreds of species
not known to be there.
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This year, we start the process,
with the Angolan government,
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to establish one of the largest systems
of protected areas in the world
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to preserve the
Okavango-Zambezi water tower
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we have been exploring.
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Downstream, this represents
water security for millions of people
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and more than half of the elephants
remaining on this planet.
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There is no doubt this is the biggest
conservation opportunity in Africa
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in decades.
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Over the next 10 to 15 years,
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we need to make
an unprecedented investment
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in the preservation
of wilderness around the world.
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To me,
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preserving wilderness is far more
than simply protecting ecosystems
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that clean the water we drink
and create the air we breathe.
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Preserving wilderness protects
our basic human right to be wild --
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our basic human rights to explore.
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Thank you.
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(Applause)