A lot of our news is about encouraging leaders to take urgent action. But, sometimes, the responsibility falls directly on us, as Maida Bilal’s story in Bosnia and Herzegovina shows. Maida, who has just been awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize, led a group of women who successfully challenged the construction of two hydropower plants on the Kruščica River in 2017 with the support of WWF-Adria and others. For 500 days and nights, they physically prevented construction from starting. Hydro plants like this lead to devastating impacts on both people and nature – everything from blocking fish migration routes to trapping sediments that would otherwise protect riverbanks against floods. Unfortunately, Maida’s well-deserved award comes at a time when thousands of harmful and unnecessary hydro plants are still being planned in the Balkans. But we will continue working with communities and partners to safeguard some of Europe’s last free-flowing rivers.
Defenders of the Kruščica River
