Cameroon

Expertise:
Law & Policy
Environmental Governance

Chair of Political and Technical Affairs

Day 2: Obligations

Panel:
The Obligations of Governments Arising From the Human Rights Impacts of Climate Change

Saturday, December 3, 2022

Augustine Njamnshi is a lawyer with 26 years of experience in environmental policy and governance advocacy in Cameroon and the Central African subregion. He has extensive experience in legislative and policy drafting in the areas of access to genetic resources and benefit sharing, biosafety, biosecurity, access to environmental information, and public participation in decision-making.

Augustine has held, and continues to hold, several elected positions representing the environmental sector of Africa’s civil society at the international level. He co-founded and led various organizations, including the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance from 2008 to 2012; was the UNEP major groups representative for Africa from 2010 to 2012; and served as the francophone African coordinator of the Access Initiative. He was the African civil society representative on the World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility as well as the Carbon Fund. He was co-chair of the African Development Bank CSO committee from 2018 to 2020 and was elected African CSO observer for Climate Investment Funds.

Njamnshi is the coordinator of the African Coalition for Sustainable Energy and Access. He is also executive secretary at Bio-Resources Development and Conservation in Cameroon, and serves as chair of political and technical affairs of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance.

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“When I was a little girl, I never heard of climate change. I never heard of floods or disasters. It was not that common.”

—Pasang Dolma Sherpa

Pasang Dolma Sherpa cherishes any time she can spend in Nepal’s mountainous region, where she grew up in a Sherpa village. Now, as an adult, she loves introducing her two young children to the beautiful natural setting and the joys of living off the land.

“That is where [my] heart is,” she said. “Everything is back to nature. . . . You have all the food on your farm.”

But the scenery Dolma Sherpa adored as a kid has changed significantly—and for the worse.

The shift in rainfall and snowfall patterns, rise of vegetation-destroying worms and insects, and other climate change­-driven issues are causing severe damage to vital crops, such as potatoes, garlic, rice and barley, and making it more challenging to raise livestock. Some Sherpa communities live in fear of avalanches and landslides, which have also destroyed spiritual sites—devastating events that people sometimes blame on themselves or an evil spirit because they don’t understand climate change, she said. 

“When I was a little girl, I never heard of climate change,” she said. “I never heard of floods or disasters. It was not that common.”

As a result, Sherpa people choose to migrate, leaving their homelands behind and restricting their chance to pass down spiritual, cultural and social values to younger generations.

Experiencing the changing weather’s harmful effects on Nepal’s Sherpa villages led Dolma Sherpa to become an advocate for Indigenous communities, specifically in the areas of climate change and environmental protection.

After working behind the scenes for the Center for Indigenous Peoples Research and Development (CIPRED) for several years, she became the organization’s executive director in 2016. The role enables her to lead efforts to address Indigenous peoples’ issues and concerns—including those related to climate change, biodiversity conservation and the management of natural resources—via policy advocacy, resources documentation, traditional livelihood empowerment and more.

Part of Dolma Sherpa’s work includes bringing the voices of Indigenous community members to relevant local, national and global government agencies and other bilateral groups to raise awareness about their contributions to the resilience and adaptation of biodiversity. Even though Indigenous peoples only make up about 6.2% of the world’s population, they protect more than 80% of the world’s biodiversity and have ancestral expertise on how to adapt and reduce climate change and disaster risks.

Dolma Sherpa said the preservation of Indigenous peoples’ cultural values and skills, such as farming native fruits and creating various handcrafts, is also important. That allows them to pass that knowledge along to young people—who can learn to value their roots and be inspired to fight the effects of climate change in the future.

“We need to balance science knowledge and the Indigenous knowledge so that our future generation will have an option in life,” she said. “When you know cultural values, that gives you the option to bring the science knowledge [you learn in the city] and also support your community on the ground.”

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Hopi Tribe, Arizona

Expertise:
Environmental Governance
Human Rights
Education

Assistant Specialist and Indigenous Resilience Affiliate

Day 3: Solutions

Panel:
Traditional Knowledge and Climate Solutions

Sunday, December 4, 2022

Michael Kotutwa Johnson is a member of the Hopi Tribe in northern Arizona. Johnson is an assistant specialist from the University of Arizona within the School of Natural Resources and the Environment, and is also affiliated with the University of Arizona’s Indigenous Resilience Center and Cooperative Extension.

Johnson holds a PhD in natural resources from the University of Arizona, a Master of Public Policy from Pepperdine University and a BS in agriculture from Cornell University. Johnson is also a co-author on the Indigenous chapter in the Fifth National Climate Assessment. His newest initiative is the call for the restoration of the American Indian food system based on the stewardship principles of Indigenous conservation and land use management schemes. Johnson continues to practice Hopi dry farming, a practice of his people for millennia, and has published in academic journals on topics including Indigenous conservation and land stewardship. 

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Cameroon

Expertise:
Environmental Governance
Climate Change & Environment
Youth Activist

Director of Programming
Pan African Center for Climate Policy

Day 3: Solutions

Panel:
Developing Climate Solutions With the Human Rights of Future Generations in Mind: What do youth have to say about that?

Sunday, December 4, 2022

Stephanie Lamma Ewi obtained a master’s degree in natural resource and environmental management from the University of Buea, spearheading research and development for nine years as an environmental and climate justice advocate in rural communities of Cameroon. After much research in these communities, she noticed the exclusion of women and girls in climate change projects and decision-making platforms. She was determined to see responsible decisions made regarding sustainable natural resource management in Cameroon and Africa, and she proposed structures that facilitate the channeling of rural voices in the process, particularly women and young people for representation in national and international platforms.

Lamma Ewi leads teams of volunteers to develop entrepreneurial support and climate leadership capacity-building programs for women and young people in rural forests and communities of Cameroon. She has been able to reach over 5,460 women and 500 young people in 162 communities in the country. She empowers women with livelihood skills like bush mango processing, beekeeping, mushroom farming, snail cultivation and micro enterprise development. Her work with rural community councils has prompted the formulation of over 20 local forest management policies in villages within Nguti and Takamanda that have stirred the construction of several nurseries with 110,000 indigenous tree species for revamping degraded sites and farmlands. Her works have recorded a 65% increase in women’s income sources and a 20% involvement of women in local councils in the communities where she works.

Lamma Ewi works directly with young people through her weekly radio program Eco-voice, an environmental awareness program on Eternity Gospel Radio and Eden Radio Limbe, Cameroon, reaching 4,000 listeners. Recently, she coordinated the establishment of a 5,000-tree nursery to combat natural disasters in Limbe. She organized the Miss Environment FOREP 2020 pageant, bringing together government institutions, 10 nongovernmental organizations, two TV stations, several media houses and 150+ people to plant more than 4,500 trees along the streets, farms and neighborhoods of Limbe. She is working with four disaster-prone communities to play football for trees, with an objective to plant 7,000 trees across her municipality.

Lamma Ewi heads a team that developed a climate change curriculum. She led her team to establish an eco club in primary schools around Limbe where they are building children’s capacities as climate ambassadors using arts. Lamma Ewi is a volunteer country mentor for the Africa Climate Reality Project, coaching 24 mentees from Bogota, Colombia, three mentees from USG/Leap Girl Africa Cameroon and 21 students from PACC Policy. She gained recognition from the United Nations Foundation as one of the six new youth voices on climate change and from the Climate Reality Project as one of 8 Women Leading on Climate. Lamma Ewi is an environmental impact consultant at the Delegation of Environment and Nature Protection in Limbe. She is a Mandela Washington fellow, YALI Regional Leadership Center alumna, a UN peace ambassador, a Joke Waller-Hunter Initiative awardee and board member of the Youth Against Slavery Movement.

Lamma Ewi says she believes that “natural resources should be for the benefits of all people and not monopolized for the benefits of few." 

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Nepal

Expertise:
Human Rights
Environmental Governance
Policy Reform Activist

Executive Director

Day 2: Obligations

Panel:
The Role of Education in Building a Global Culture of Knowledge and Inquiry �鶹ӰԺ Climate Change, Its Human Rights Impacts and Solutions

Saturday, December 3, 2022

Feature Story

Pasang Dolma Sherpa, executive director of Center for Indigenous Peoples' Research and Development (CIPRED), has worked with Indigenous peoples, women and local communities for the recognition of the Indigenous peoples’ knowledge, cultural values and customary institutions that contributed to sustainable management of forest, ecosystem, biodiversity and climate resilience for more than a decade. Her work includes a focus on climate issues of Sherpas in the Himalaya, as well as global policy work on loss and damage.

Sherpa obtained her PhD at Kathmandu University in 2018 on climate change education and its interfaces with Indigenous knowledge. She has served multiple organizations, including:

• Co-chair of the International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum on Climate Change (IIPFCC)
• Co-chair of the Facilitative Working Group (FWG) of Local Communities and Indigenous Peoples’ Platform (LCIP) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
• Board member of UN-REDD, Participant Committee of FCPF, World Bank

Sherpa holds multiple roles while also representing different forums, networks and institutions nationally and internationally. Her current positions include:

• Member of the Facilitative Working Group of the LCIPP within UNFCCC
• Chair of the Specialist Group on Indigenous Peoples, Customary, and Environmental Laws and Human Rights (SPICEH) within CEESP-IUCN
• Visiting faculty member at Kathmandu University
• Steering committee member to the white papers led by IPCC, UNESCO and ECOMOS
• Advisor to the One Ocean Hub based in the UK
• Advisor to the CMA based in Canada

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Kenya

Expertise:
Environmental Governance
Human Rights

Program Monitoring, Reporting and Learning Team

Day 1: Impacts

Panel:

Friday, December 2, 2022

Edna Kaptoyo is a social development specialist and an advocate for Indigenous peoples' rights, and climate and gender justice. An expert in the field for over 15 years, Kaptoyo’s focus includes environmental governance, human and Indigenous peoples' rights, and sustainable development projects and policy. Kaptoyo is passionate about sustainable development and the promotion of interdisciplinary approaches to capacity development, project design, and project implementation and policy.

She has keen interest in co-developing projects and supporting sustainable self-determined development. Her work at local, regional and international levels provides reflective spaces that enable local actors to connect and share solutions, shape policy and ensure voices of Indigenous peoples—including Indigenous women—are heard. 

Pawanka Fund is a global Indigenous-led fund changing the way philanthropy is done. Guided by Indigenous values of reciprocity, the Indigenous governance body is composed of leaders from around the globe, including North America, Latin America, Asia, Africa, the Arctic, the Pacific and Russia. 

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