Albert I: an environmental awareness pioneer

At the age of 58, he established the Albert I Foundation in Paris, known as the Oceanographic Institute. A recognised public interest organisation, the foundation’s purpose is to continue the scientific work begun by Prince Albert I. “All of the knowledge which he acquired about the sea enabled him to develop a genuine awareness of the environment, and to recognise the threats facing the ocean.

In 1921, he gave a speech at the National Museum in Washington to members of the US National Academy of Sciences, in which he sounded the alarm regarding the changes and pressures being experienced by the seabed,” explains Robert Calcagno, CEO of the Oceanographic Institute, today.

A humanist with a keen interest in prehistory, Prince Albert I also embarked on archaeological digs. It is to him that we owe the Monaco Museum of Prehistoric Anthropology, as well as a second Prince Albert I Foundation in Paris, whose purpose is “scientific progress on all issues relating to the origins and history of human fossils.”

In our world today, where the environment is under threat, where the human values that are key to any policy are too often ignored or are called into question, the messages contained in his pioneering work have, more than ever before, something critical to teach us.

Prince Albert II