A liberal California publishing company and an activist family foundation are initiating a $5,000 "Defender of the Earth Award" for a previously unpublished nonfiction manuscript on the environment.

Red Hen Press, of Granada Hills, Ca., and the Los Angeles-based David Family Foundation, which generously supports the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and other activist organizations, points to "thousands of awards for everything from fiction and poetry to travel writing and illustrated books."

Saying environmental writing "is far too underappreciated not only in today's ever wasteful and unconcerned society, but in the publishing world as well," Red Hen says the new award is designed to overcome a particular concern: "Somewhere along the way we have managed to ignore a whole group of writers dedicated to a significant cause: defending the Earth."

Red Hen bills the new award project as "the only $5,000 award for a book on the environment," and it says the winning manuscript will be "distributed across the country at events set up to promote environmental awareness."

Deadline for award submissions, of no less than 64 manuscript pages, is August 30, 2004. There is no reading fee or submission fee for entries. The award judges are five well-known national environmental activists: John H. Adams, NRDC; poet and essayist Alison Hawthorne Deming; Earth Day Co-Founder, Denis Hayes; NRDC environmental lawyer, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.; and Sierra Club Executive Director Carl Pope.

The award is intended to be an annual event, but the sponsors say "lack of exposure" resulted in their receiving too few nominees in 2003. They are hoping to choose from among no fewer than 100 environmental manuscripts this year. Information on the award (http://www.redhen.org/2004literaryawards.htm) or contact Mike Vukadinovich (mike@redhen.org).