Adriana Elisabeth Hoffmann Jacoby (29 January 1940 – 20 March 2022) was a Chilean botanist, environmentalist and author. She was executive secretary of Chile's National Environment Commission (, CONAMA) from 2000 to 2001. She advocated for the sustainable management and protection of Chilean forests, leading opposition to

illegal logging Illegal logging is the harvest, transportation, purchase or sale of timber in violation of laws. The harvesting procedure itself may be illegal, including using corrupt means to gain access to forests; extraction without permission, or from a pro ...

in her role as coordinator of Defensores del Bosque Chileno (Defenders of the Chilean Forest) since 1992. Hoffmann authored over a dozen books on the

flora of Chile Flora is all the plant life present in a particular region or time, generally the naturally occurring (indigenous) native plants. Sometimes bacteria and fungi are also referred to as flora, as in the terms '' gut flora'' or '' skin flora''. E ...

, as well as 106 botanical names, mostly realignments of species and infraspecific taxa of

cactus A cactus (, or less commonly, cactus) is a member of the plant family Cactaceae, a family comprising about 127 genera with some 1750 known species of the order Caryophyllales. The word ''cactus'' derives, through Latin, from the Ancient Greek ...

Biography

Adriana Hoffmann was born in

Santiago Santiago (, ; ), also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile as well as one of the largest cities in the Americas. It is the center of Chile's most densely populated region, the Santiago Metropolitan Region, whose ...

Lola Lola may refer to: Places * Lolá, a or subdistrict of Panama * Lola Township, Cherokee County, Kansas, United States * Lola Prefecture, Guinea * Lola, Guinea, a town in Lola Prefecture * Lola Island, in the Solomon Islands People * Lola (fo ...

(''née'' Jacoby) and Franz Hoffmann in 1940. She grew up in Providencia and attended Liceo Manuel de Salas. She was accepted at the

University of Chile The University of Chile ( es, Universidad de Chile) is a public research university in Santiago, Chile. It was founded on November 19, 1842, and inaugurated on September 17, 1843.

where she initially studied

agronomy Agronomy is the science and technology of producing and using plants by agriculture for food, fuel, fiber, chemicals, recreation, or land conservation. Agronomy has come to include research of plant genetics, plant physiology, meteorology, and ...

. She joined her mother when she traveled to Germany to study psychiatric techniques and there Adriana changed her focus to biology and specialized in botany and ecology. After she finished her studies, she returned to Chile and married engineer Hernán Calderón. They lived abroad for a time until returning to Chile in the 1970s. Through her career, Hoffmann traveled throughout Chile, documenting flora and describing species. By April 2008, she had identified and classified 106 new cactus species. In 1992, Hoffmann became coordinator of the non-profit organization Defensores del Bosque Chileno, Chile's largest forest protection group. She formed Agrupación de Defensores del Bosque Nativo in 1994, a group whose founding members included well-known singers and poets as well as economist

Manfred Max Neef Artur Manfred Max Neef (; 26 October 1932 – 8 August 2019) was a Chilean economist of German descent. Max-Neef was born in Valparaíso, Chile. He started his career as a professor of economics at the University of California, Berkeley in the ea ...

and Bishop

Bernardino Piñera Monsignor Bernardino Piñera Carvallo (22 September 1915 – 21 June 2020) was a Chilean bishop of the Roman Catholic Church. Life Born in Paris, France, Piñera was ordained a priest on 5 April 1947. He worked for the Catholic Action. On 11 ...

. By the mid-1990s, Hoffmann was recognized as one of Chile's premier environmental activists. Hoffmann served on the board of the Lahuen Foundation, a forest preservation organization that established El Cañi Sanctuary. She also played a leading role in the Chilean Science Society, Biology Society of Chile, Earth Foundation,

International Union for Conservation of Nature The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN; officially International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natu ...

, and the Association of Chilean Female Leaders. Hoffmann's efforts with Defensores del Bosque included developing

environmental education Environmental education (EE) refers to organized efforts to teach how natural environments function, and particularly, how human beings can manage behavior and ecosystems to live sustainably. It is a multi-disciplinary field integrating discip ...

programs for teachers. Hoffmann was appointed by President

Ricardo Lagos Ricardo Froilán Lagos Escobar (; born 2 March 1938) is a Chilean lawyer, economist and social-democratic politician who served as president of Chile from 2000 to 2006. During the 1980s he was a well-known opponent of the Chilean military di ...

in March 2000 to serve as executive secretary of the National Environment Commission, a precursor of Chile's Ministry for the Environment. During her tenure she oversaw the creation of the national

hiking trail A trail, also known as a path or track, is an unpaved lane or small road usually passing through a natural area. In the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, a path or footpath is the preferred term for a pedestrian or hiking trail. The ...

network

Sendero de Chile Hiking in Chile is characterized by a wide range of environments and climates for hikers, which largely results from Chile's unusual, ribbon-like shape, which is 4,300 kilometres (2,700 miles) long and on average 175 kilometres (109 miles) wide. T ...

, improved the System of Environmental Impact Assessment (SEIA), and worked to implement environmental education programs and improve air quality in Santiago. During her tenure she encountered criticism from business interests for her environmentalist stances and from environmental groups for her perceived lack of influence within the administration. Following the controversial approval of

petcoke Petroleum coke, abbreviated coke or petcoke, is a final carbon-rich solid material that derives from oil refining, and is one type of the group of fuels referred to as cokes. Petcoke is the coke that, in particular, derives from a final cracki ...

for gas-fired generators over her objections, Hoffmann resigned in October 2001, stating that she no longer felt she was supported by Lagos or the Ministers. She returned to work with Defensores del Bosque and prepared for her eventual retirement. Hoffmann died on 20 March 2022.

Environmental advocacy

During Pinochet's dictatorship, the government gave multinational timber firms unfettered access to Chilean forests and little incentive to process the lumber in-country. Hoffmann has noted that the rapidly disappearing private native forests are mostly wasted through exports of wood chips. In a 1995 article she remarked: "We've seen with our own eyes how imber companiestake immense trees and shred the whole thing, branches and all." Beginning with her involvement with Defensores del Bosque, Hoffmann agitated for the reform of Chilean forestry practices. She was a vocal advocate for

sustainable forest management Sustainable forest management (SFM) is the management of forests according to the principles of sustainable development. Sustainable forest management has to keep the balance between three main pillars: ecological, economic and socio-cultural. ...

in the country, arguing that

ecotourism Ecotourism is a form of tourism involving responsible travel (using sustainable transport) to natural areas, conserving the environment, and improving the well-being of the local people. Its purpose may be to educate the traveler, to provide funds ...

and value-added products like furniture lead to greater long-term revenue. Hoffmann wrote columns about ecology for ''

El Mercurio ''El Mercurio'' (known online as ''El Mercurio On-Line'', ''EMOL'') is a Chilean newspaper with editions in Valparaíso and Santiago. Its Santiago edition is considered the country's newspaper of record and it is considered the oldest daily in t ...

'' in the 1990s and opposed free trade agreements that would replace native forests with commercial tree plantations. She criticized the Chilean government for not adopting a forestry policy. Hoffmann befriended American businessman and preservationist

Douglas Tompkins Douglas Rainsford Tompkins (March 20, 1943 – December 8, 2015) was an American businessman, conservationist, outdoorsman, philanthropist, filmmaker, and agriculturalist. He co-founded the North Face Inc, Esprit and various environmental grou ...

, who provided funding for Defensores del Bosque. She defended his efforts to establish a 1,200-acre nature reserve in the

Chilean Lake District The Chilean Lake District is a zone in Southern Chile defined by its many lakes in the Andean foothills. The term is primarily used in tourism literature and advertising, in Chile Zona Sur is preferred as a geographical concept. The Chilean Lake ...

. ''The New York Times'' reported that she said: "If this investment were anywhere else but Chile, Mr. Tompkins would be considered a hero. But it happened in Chile, where envy and jealousy and business interests are institutions."

Awards and honors

Hoffmann was recognized by the United Nations in 1997 as one of the 25 leading environmentalists of the decade for her efforts to protect Chile's forests. For her research into Chilean flora and her work in environmental education, Hoffmann received the Luis Oyarzún Award from the Austral University of Chile in 2003. She received a Fellow Award from the

Cactus and Succulent Society of America The Cactus and Succulent Society of America (CSSA) is a horticultural society which is based in Claremont, California. History The CSSA was founded in 1929 in Los Angeles County, at Pasadena, California and has grown to encompass over 80 aff ...

in 2009. Hoffmann served on the judging panel for the

United Nations Environment Programme The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is responsible for coordinating responses to environmental issues within the United Nations system. It was established by Maurice Strong, its first director, after the United Nations Conference on th ...

's Sasakawa Prize.

Works

Hoffmann authored more than a dozen books and illustrated field guides on the flora, medicinal plants and botanical resources of Chile. Among her works was ''La Tragedia del Bosque Chileno'', which includes text and photographs that document

in Chilean forests. ;Papers * ;Books * * * * * * * * * * * *

References

External links