Illustration by Sebastien Thibault
People-Powered Solutions: Connecting Local Communities and Global Challenges
Champions of Fair Labor: Ensuring Worker Rights and Economic Justice
Guardians of the Public Square: Protecting Civic Engagement
Climate Justice Cultivators: Strengthening Community Land and Resource Rights
Global South Architects: Rethinking Sovereign Debt and Global Finance
Public Interest Innovators: Advocating for the Public Good in Global Tech
Defenders of Dignity: Building a Safe and Gender Just Future for All
Climate Justice Cultivators: Strengthening Community Land and Resource Rights
To plant the seeds for a just and sustainable future, communities most affected by climate change must be at the heart of climate action. However, current decarbonization efforts and extractive practices risk deepening injustices against communities that are putting their lives on the line to protect some of the world’s most important ecosystems. We champion collaborative global systems that are rooted in the voices of Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities so their rights are protected and their strategies for forest protection, biodiversity conservation, and sustainable energy transitions are reflected in policies and practices to advance climate justice worldwide.
By building people-centered frameworks that secure land tenure and resource rights, we ensure those most affected by climate injustice lead the transition from exploitative and profit-driven models toward more inclusive and regenerative structures, where communities have agency in caring for natural resources and benefiting from climate solutions.
The Indonesian Center for Environmental Law: Ensuring a Just Energy Transition
As Indonesia embarks on an ambitious transition to clean energy, the Indonesian Center for Environmental Law is working to ensure it benefits people across the country by crafting policy recommendations that reflect the needs of communities and supporting them in voicing their rights on climate justice issues.
Kodzo Yaotse: Ensuring Equitable Resource-Sharing Across Africa
Africa’s communities rarely benefit from their own natural resources and are excluded from decisions that shape their futures. The Africa Center for Energy Policy fights for transparent, equitable energy governance, ensuring historically excluded voices drive the green transition and share in economic opportunities.
Weaving a Stronger Civil Society in the Global South
Ford’s Weaving Resilience initiative supports civil society organizations throughout the Global South, with a focus on supporting local solutions and connecting them globally.
Endangered Eden: The Fight to Protect Ghana’s Atewa Forest
Ghana’s Atewa Forest provides water for 5 million people and harbors rich biodiversity. As mining threatens this paradise, A Rocha Ghana’s conservationists fight to protect it.
“A truly just energy transition must foster new job opportunities in emerging sectors, secure energy affordability, and enhance community resilience. Indeed, those who are most impacted by economic changes and climate threats must have an opportunity to actively participate in the transition process.”
How Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities Are Shaping the Future of Climate Funding
Indigenous Peoples and local communities are launching their own funds and grantmaking programs, transforming how climate finance reaches frontline leaders.
A Path to Justice: The Ford Foundation’s Commitment to an Energy Transition in Indonesia
As the Indonesian Just Energy Transition Partnership program leads the nation’s shift away from fossil fuels, civil society and local communities look to shape emerging energy changes.
Ford Foundation Supports Efforts to Center Justice in Africa’s Energy Transition
Learn about Ford and partners’ five-year, multifaceted initiative to advance just energy transitions across Africa and deliver social and economic development.
Centering Indigenous Voices in the Climate Movement with Aimee Roberson and Tristan Ahtone
Cultural Survival’s Aimee Roberson and Grist’s Tristan Ahtone join Charles Blow for a conversation on the importance of centering Indigenous voices in solutions for climate change.
Transcript
GALINA ANGAROVA [a woman from the Ekhirit nation of the Buryat Peoples, a Russian indigenous group, wearing a white blouse and black sweater, Executive Director of SIRGE Coalition]:
The world we want is one where there are enough resources for everyone, and the world where everyone is thriving. Over 54% of all transition minerals needed for this energy transition is located either on or near Indigenous people’s lands and territories, and that fact poses an existential threat to many Indigenous peoples. The SIRGE Coalition stands for Securing Indigenous Peoples’ Rights in the Green Economy. And we are a coalition of Indigenous leaders, Indigenous-led organizations, and allies who came together to secure Indigenous peoples’ rights in this new digital and energy transition.
Today, we’re in conversations with over a dozen end-user companies that are seriously considering Indigenous people’s rights and are willing to put free, prior, and informed consent into their policies: environmental policies, human rights policies, supplier code of conduct. Free, prior, and informed consent is the right that belongs to Indigenous peoples. It does not belong to governments, it does not belong to corporations. Indigenous peoples offer solutions. We’re not victims. We’re not beneficiaries. We’re decision-makers, we’re protagonists, and we’re actors in our own lives.
End of transcript.
Accessibility Statement
- All videos produced by the Ford Foundation since 2020 include captions and downloadable transcripts. For videos where visuals require additional understanding, we offer audio-described versions.
- We are continuing to make videos produced prior to 2020 accessible.
- Videos from third-party sources (those not produced by the Ford Foundation) may not have captions, accessible transcripts, or audio descriptions.
- To improve accessibility beyond our site, we’ve created a free video accessibility WordPress plug-in.
Transcript
JOSHUA AMPONSEM [An African man from Ghana wearing a white shirt and blue jacket, Co-Director and Youth Climate Justice Fund]:
The world we want is one where young people are seen as drivers, movers, shakers, and leaders of today and tomorrow. In the world I live in now, only 0.76 [percent] of climate philanthropy is going into the hands of young climate leaders. We cannot say that young people are the last generation to fight the climate crisis and not trust them with resources. At the Youth Climate Justice Fund, we focus on three main areas.
One, holding policymakers accountable to their existing promises and pledges. The second part is raising ambition on climate and making sure that we are supporting groups that are helping the world leaders meet their targets. The third part is building leadership rooted in community. We want to build and support young people to become the next leaders in philanthropy, in businesses, in intergovernmental organizations connected to their communities, and truly representing them at a broader scale.
Young people, particularly those from the Global South, are currently living through one of the toughest times of their lives, and the future ahead of them is very uncertain. Young people from these communities need to be included in decision making, in the planning, the implementation, but also trust and resources in their hands directly to create a new future, the future that fits their vision of a better world and a resilient world.
End of transcript.
Accessibility Statement
- All videos produced by the Ford Foundation since 2020 include captions and downloadable transcripts. For videos where visuals require additional understanding, we offer audio-described versions.
- We are continuing to make videos produced prior to 2020 accessible.
- Videos from third-party sources (those not produced by the Ford Foundation) may not have captions, accessible transcripts, or audio descriptions.
- To improve accessibility beyond our site, we’ve created a free video accessibility WordPress plug-in.
Themes
Illustrations by Sebastien Thibault