Jane Goodall shares secret to staying ‘fit as a fiddle’ at 90

Award-winning conservationist explains why she shows no signs of slowing down

Jane Goodall says she is 'fit as a fiddle' at 90 thanks to a vegan diet that keeps her healthy. Chris Whiteoak / The National

A plant-based diet and a life with purpose are at the core of conservationist Jane Goodall’s mantra to keeping fit at 90.

A vegan diet keeps her active and alert as she travels about 300 days a year.

The award-winning environmentalist, who will turn 91 on April 3, has a jam-packed calendar, visiting international conferences and green projects she has launched around the world.

Dr Goodall told The National she had little time for meditation and keeps busy with tours, meetings and business calls.

Here is some insight into how the British primatologist keeps up the pace and shows no signs of slowing down.

“I’m vegan and I’m fit as a fiddle,” she said. “A plant-based diet is really, really important and, luckily, more and more people are becoming vegetarian or even vegan.”

'Don't have time to meditate'

When asked about her daily routine, if she meditated or did yoga, she spoke of how immersed she is in her life work of protecting the natural world.

“I just get through each day as best I can. I don't have time to meditate,” Dr Goodall said. "I do what I have to do, catch up with emails, videos, do zoom, do interviews and meet people and give talks, lectures. And that's my life. The other thing is I don't think about my health, I just be.”

I didn’t become vegan just because of my health, I became vegan for ethical reasons

Jane Goodall,
renowned conservationist

She said between speaking tours that keep her on the road “about 300 days in a year,” she gets a few weeks and Christmas to spend with her family.

Knowledge about the cruelty and suffering animals undergo in factory farms where they are slaughtered made her turn vegan.

“I didn’t become vegan just because of my health. I became vegan for ethical reasons,” she said.

“I became vegan when I realised the horror of the factory farms but then I realised the other benefits to our health. Our gut is not made to eat heavy meat and we can get lots of digestive problems.

“Now we also know that animals in these horrible factory farms are intelligent and how they are cooped up is absolutely terrible.”

Cutting out meat and dairy products is a path to reduce the impact on the environment, climate scientists have long said. Her advice is to lead by example and not harangue people into giving up meat.

“I’m vegan for the environment because of the amount of grain that is grown to feed animals that we breed to eat,” she said.

“Huge areas of land are destroyed and cleared to feed animals and more grain is grown to feed these animals than food produced for humans.

“Pesticides are used and this is killing off the biodiversity of areas. Cattle produce lots of methane which is a vicious greenhouse gas.”

Message to young people

The United Nations Messenger of Peace is famous for her groundbreaking research on wild chimpanzees in Gombe, Tanzania, that gave insight into their emotional behaviour, how they used tools and revolutionised understanding between the link between animals and human beings.

Dr Goodall visited Dubai last week to launch a bee park named in her honour at Expo City Dubai, called Jane Goodall’s Pollinator Garden.

Jane Goodall hopes a new bee garden at Expo City Dubai will inspire the community. Chris Whiteoak / The National

She met with school pupils and young people involved in the Roots & Shoots programme in the UAE, one of 70 nations where the Jane Goodall Institute spreads the word to care for the Earth, protect nature and fight the climate crisis.

“The most important message for every young person and every adult too is to remember that every day you live you make some impact on the planet,” she said.

“What you buy, did it harm the environment? Was it cruel to animals? Is it cheap because of unfair wages? Do they cost a little bit more? Maybe. But then you will value them more and waste less because waste is tremendously important. Also young people can influence their parents and grandparents, I know that for a fact.”

There was no sign of flagging energy levels as she posed for photographs, signed books and took questions.

At the end of her visit to Dubai, during a Q&A session open to the public, a spirited Dr Goodall urged the crowd to stand up and chant: “Together we can, together we will, together we must change the world.”

Jane Goodall through the years - in pictures

• 

  Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, who was Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi at the time, thanks Dr Jane Goodall after her lecture at Al Bateen Palace. Ryan Carter / Crown Prince Court

• 

  Jane Goodall in December 1965 on location in Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania. Getty Images

• 

  Jane Goodall receives an environmental award from the Sheik Zayed Private Academy in Abu Dhabi. Victor Besa / The National

• 

  British primatologist Jane Goodall with a baby Cariblanco monkey during her visit to a primate rescue centre in Chile in 2013. AFP

• 

  Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, and Dr Goodall at a Roots & Shoots Global Leadership meeting at Windsor Castle in July 2019. Getty Images

• 

  Goodall with children during a visit to the chimp rescue centre in June 2018 in Entebbe, Uganda. AFP

• 

  Goodall with one of her research subjects in the Gombe National Park in northern Tanzania. Getty Images

• 

  Conservationist Jane Goodall during an interview with host Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show, September 14, 2017. Getty Images

• 

  Goodall in the garden of Groningen University at the Sharing the Planet conference in June 2002 in Groningen, Netherlands. Getty Images

• 

  Queen Elizabeth II and Dr Goodall DBE after the annual Commonwealth Day Observance Service in March 2012 in London. Getty Images

• 

  Goodall with the Bambi award 'Our Earth' at the Bambi 2010 Award Winners Board in November 2010 in Potsdam, Germany. Getty Images

• 

  UN peace messenger Goodall waits for a meeting with a gorilla family at the Zoo Park and Botanic Garden in Budapest, Hungary, in 2008. AFP

• 

  Goodall during an interview with host Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show, January 3, 1984. Getty Images

• 

  Goodall during a visit to Taronga Zoo in Sydney, Australia, in 2006 to raise awareness of the plight of wild Chimpanzees. Getty Images

• 

  Leonardo DiCaprio and Goodall at the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation Gala at Jackson Park Ranch in Santa Rosa, California, September 2018. AFP

• 

  Goodall with Pola, a young chimpanzee, in Budapest Zoo in December 2004, more than 40 years after she began her pioneering study of the primates. AFP

• 

  Jane Goodall married wildlife photographer Hugo Arndt Rodolf, Baron van Lawick, in London on March 28, 1964. Getty Images

• 

  Goodall in the television special Miss Goodall and the World of Chimpanzees originally broadcast on CBS, in December 1965. Getty Images

• 

  Goodall during an interview with Jay Leno on May 1, 1990. Getty Images

• 

  Goodall posing with the new Jane Goodall Barbie doll in Los Angeles. Reuters

• 

  Sigourney Weaver in a scene from the 1988 film Gorillas in the Mist. Photo: Warner Brothers

• 

  Schoolchildren from across the UAE lined up to get an autograph from Goodall, who in 2016 visited Abu Dhabi to celebrate 25 years of her Roots & Shoots programme. Delores Johnson / The National

• 

  UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon and Goodall at the United Nations Climate Change Conference and Cop17 conference in Durban on December 7, 2011. AFP

• 

  When Goodall mentioned population sizes, the underlying assumption was that different sections of the world’s population are similarly responsible for the climate crisis. Photo: Emirates Literature Foundation

• 

  Anthropologist Jane Goodall with husband Hugo van Lawick in 1974. AP

• 

  Goodall during the 50th annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. EPA

• 

  Goodall made numerous scientific breakthroughs in the field of animal behaviour. Photo: National Geographic

• 

  Jane Goodall at the Jane Goodall Institute in Silver Spring, Maryland, in February 2003. Getty Images