Thirty years ago, the Earth Summit, which took place in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro, paved the way for the establishment of three major conventions on the environment - specifically on biodiversity, climate change and desertification.
As countries meet on all three conventions in 2022, SDG Advocate and indigenous rights activist Hindou Ibrahim talks about the indispensable role that indigenous communities around the world play in protecting life on our planet - its biodiversity, land and climate.
“As indigenous peoples, we say, we are not different than the rest of the species, we are only one species of nature, so we cannot harm the rest of them. So that's why living in harmony, it's connecting each other, respecting each other and trying to keep the balance without harming the rest of the species - species of nature,” says Ibrahim.
She is no stranger to international climate change, human rights and sustainability processes. In 1999, at just 15 years of age, she founded the Association of Indigenous Peul Women and Peoples of Chad, a community-based organization that promotes the rights of girls and women in Chad’s Mbororo community which she belongs to. In the years following, she became the co-chair of the International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Climate Change, and today she is one of the 17 eminent global leaders known as the SDG Advocates.