Indigenous peoples call for urgent environmental action

Earlier this month, Greenhouse helped to amplify the voices of Indigenous communities from across the globe in their call for urgent environmental action. During the Flourishing Diversity Series, representatives travelled from 13 Indigenous communities to London to appeal for recognition of their role in protecting land and species biodiversity.

Greenhouse and the Flourishing Diversity Series team worked in partnership with the London National Park City, XR Youth and the XR Internationalist Solidarity Network to highlight the importance of Indigenous rights in combatting climate change and securing our collective future. Those present represented a diverse range of communities including:

• The Ashaninka and Guarani of the Amazon, whose Newton Prize-winning restoration of degraded and damaged forests is an example to the world.
• The Idu Mishmi of India, whose traditional Himalayan way of life supports higher densities of tigers and other endangered species than do neighbouring tiger reserves.
• The Arhuaco of Colombia, whose ancestors have cared for the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta and the balance of the world for thousands of years. 
• The Ju|’Hoan of Namibia, who established the first internationally recognized land conservancy in Namibia.

Indigenous communities have much to share in addressing the joint crises of mass species extinction and global heating. Indigenous peoples govern 65% of the Earth’s land area, yet this landmass is estimated to host 80% of the world’s biodiversity. Until now, these communities have barely been acknowledged for their role in solving restoring environments. As a result, the Flourishing Diversity Series was set up with the following objectives:

1) To protect Indigenous ‘territories of life’ from extractive industry, large infrastructural developments and industrial agriculture.

2) To vigorously resist resource exploitation and consumption patterns that threaten diversity.

3) To encourage all to become part of the solution by taking responsibility for the spaces we have influence over and creating places where diversity can flourish.

Greenhouse was tasked with raising awareness of the series and its aims and – in doing so – to allow the voices of Indigenous leaders to be heard on a global platform. 

Our support included:

• The creation and launch of a new report: Flourishing Diversity Series: Learning from Indigenous Wisdom Traditions.
• Social media strategy and implementation to share content before, during and after the events, engaging pre-defined audiences. 
• Co-ordinating and hosting a photocall at the start of the Series, marked by an opening ceremony led by Indigenous leaders. 
• Arranged media interviews at the public and private events hosted by Flourishing Diversity.

As a result, the series was featured in detail on BBC Costing The Earth and BBC World Service Radio, alongside print articles in TIME Magazine, Forbes and METRO, and more.

The series also secured attendance from high profile individuals at ‘Listening Sessions’, wherein influential figures from film, music, business, fashion, human rights, conservation and finance listened to Indigenous speakers share wisdom on living in harmony with the environment, bringing Indigenous voices front and centre.

The series brought lesser-heard answers to the climate crisis to the forefront, allowing us to explore a diversity of responses to the climate and ecological emergency.

By appealing to what it fundamentally means to be human, Flourishing Diversity offers a collective response to restoring our planet that unifies cultures across the globe. FDS seeks to focus people’s minds on what they can do, instead of what they can’t.

– Flourishing Diversity Report

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