When the World Wildlife Fund recently identified the top 200 places on earth with the highest and most fragile biodiversity, they found that 95 percent of them were on Indigenous territories. In just one example, La Amistad Biosphere Reserve, which is next to the territory of the Ngobe people, harbors 4 percent of all terrestrial species of life on earth, and 30 percent of those are found nowhere else. Indigenous lands also contain most of the world's remaining forests as well as minerals and undammed rivers, so they are ripe targets for extractive industries.
Around the globe, Indigenous communities are under assault by corporations that want to exploit their lands for mining, oil, logging, and agro-industrial projects. Indigenous communities resist in skillful and courageous ways, but their protests are too often ignored by decision makers in government and corporate offices.
Global Response organizes international campaigns that magnify Indigenous Peoples voices and get results. Through letter-writing campaigns and complementary strategies, we urge governments and corporations to uphold the rights of Indigenous Peoples and enforce laws and international treaties to protect the environment.
Our success in these campaigns depends on your participation. Your letters can help the world’s most vulnerable peoples protect some of the world’s most valuable ecosystems. During our 20-year history, we have already celebrated victories in almost half of our campaigns.
