Environmental Defenders-ED

The Environmental Defenders (ED) is an ecofeminist and collaborative environmental justice organization that works to protect biodiversity and Indigenous Peoples’ rights. We work in the Albertine Rift region (Murchison-Semliki, Greater Virunga, and Ituri landscapes), which borders the Democratic Republic of the Congo et Uganda. We are committed to fostering resiliency for environmental and human security, assisting marginalized Indigenous Peoples and traditional communities in the Albertine Rift region to live sustainably and safeguard their cultural practices, water sources, lands, and surrounding environment. The purpose of environmental defenders' actions is to safeguard the environment by preserving forest ecology and using natural solutions as a climate change defense strategy. Encourage equitable governance, effective management, and positive conservation outcomes. Our actions are intended to defend and protect the environment, the people who live in it, and the wildlife that depends on it. We also want to support marginalized indigenous communities in their efforts to sustainably live, protect their water sources, and preserve the environment in which they live. We think that recognized environmental and human rights concepts embody everyone’s right to a safe, healthy, and ecologically sound environment and that environmental deterioration results in violations of human rights such as the right to life, health, and culture. Environmental Defenders implements its projects in a variety of ways, including the following: Tree planting and reforestation, seed banking and collection, biodiversity monitoring, restoring damaged land, preserving and restoring habitat for wildlife and plants, environmental education, and awareness campaigns. Empowering people to develop resilience in the face of adversity, assisting indigenous communities in advocating for and taking direct action against illegal land sales and forced evictions that frequently occur without their Free, Prior, and informed Consent, and providing direct legal support, land surveying, and mapping. We form, register, support, and equip women’s groups. Increasing agricultural productivity and market access, forming and strengthening producer groups and cooperatives through training, learning exchange, multi-stakeholder dialogue platforms, business mentoring, and coaching in gender, life skills, financial and basic literacy, and numeracy skills. We safeguard, protect, and defend environmental activists and defenders of land rights who are persecuted, injured, or in danger as a result of their work to save their environment, land rights, and tenure security. Among other things, we provide psychosocial assistance, courses on personal/organizational and digital security, relocation, legal, and medical emergency grants, as well as emergency support services.

https://watetezi.org/