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.”

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.

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