Support 50 Global South Environmental Leaders

We are proud to share some of what we have in store for this summer. Thanks to support from the Salvia Foundation, GESA 2014 will begin with a five-day retreat in the Swiss mountain town of Kandersteg. The Salvia Goethe Retreat, led by Emily Ryan, is titled Dynamic Engagement, a Goethean Approach to Connection. Its purpose is to ground the participants and the entire three-week academy in a profound connection and commitment to the natural world, inspired and informed by the majestic Alpine setting. Through the lens and application of the Goethean process, GESA participants will foster their capacity to experience the world holistically. Workshop activities will focus on generating self-reflective practice, establishing a strong learning community, sharing tools for creative resolution of conflicts arising from conservation and development, and exploring modes of socio-ecological resurgence and resilience. Participants will have the opportunity to get to know one another away from the bustle of the city, with time to make meals, take walks, and share stories together.

A word on our participants

Our group of finalists continue working, both in their home communities and institutions and through GlobalGiving, to raise funds to attend GESA 2014. We would like to profile one successful applicant, Eda Elif Tibet. Eda is an independent documentary filmmaker and visual anthropologist from Turkey whose passion for the cultural aspects of being human is depicted through her films. Her first documentary film, 28 Days on the Moon, pays homage to her ancestral roots in Cappadocia, Turkey, while advocating for local livelihoods in a UNESCO World Heritage Site and Protected Area. This was closely followed by Amchi, a film that advocates for the transmission of traditional knowledge in rural areas of Ladakh in India.

Eda’s films have been screened both within her country and around the world, a growing testament to her aim to advocate for local livelihood rights and their conservation through ethical and anthropologically inspired film-making. Now in her first year of a PhD on Social Anthropology at the Yeditepe University in Istanbul, Eda continues working in film, currently developing a story on a nomadic family from the Sarkeçili tribe, who herd 500 goats in Southern Turkey. The goal of the film is to engage support to protect nomadic pastoralists' livelihood rights.

Visit our Participants page to learn more about Eda and the other emerging environmental changemakers lined up to attend GESA 2014.

We are making progress in choosing the emerging environmental leaders who will attend the fourth Global Environments Summer Academy, which will take place at the Centre for Development and Environment (CDE) of the University of Bern between July 26^th and August 15^th of this year. Over three months, from late 2013 to early 2014, we received over 300 impressive applications from aspiring environmentalists in 75 countries. A panel of ten reviewers diligently read the applications of shortlisted candidates, allowing us to make the tough choice of who would advance.

The finalists, from 38 countries, are now vying for the 18-21 spaces available through an ongoing process that emphasizes the need to attain a balance of men and women, regions, academic backgrounds and research interests in the Academy. The response this year reveals that interest in GESA is expanding to new parts of the world: 19 countries in Africa (Democratic Republic of the Congo, South Africa, Uganda and Zimbabwe), Asia (Cambodia, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Sri Lanka, Russia and Vietnam), Europe (Croatia, Italy, Netherlands, Poland and Switzerland), Latin America & the Caribbean (Belize, Dominican Republic and Guatemala) and the Pacific (Fiji) are represented for the very first time in our group of finalists.

The diversity of interests of this group, spanning agrobiodiversity, conflict resolution, environmental history, natural resource management, gender and environment, renewable energy, sustainable livelihoods and wellbeing and many more topics, is ensuring that GESA 2014 will be an avenue to explore the most critical contemporary environmental issues from multiple perspectives.

Over the next week, we are trying to raise £5000 to provide fee waivers for three GESA participants, one each from Africa, Asia and Latin America. Please give us a hand! Make a donation starting now, and please share this link with your friends. We are competing for a cash bonus of £1,000 by generating the largest amount donated and a special £500 bonus by getting the greatest number of unique donations by the end of the week. The bonus week will last until March 10th 11:59 am GMT, so please make your donation before then.

Photos of GESA alumni

1. GESA 2012 alum, Antonia Barreau Daly (far right), from Chile, is currently exploring the relationships between food sovereignty and accessibility to forests for Mapuche families inhabiting the Andean temperate forests of southern Chile as part of her MSc research.

2. GESA 2013 alum, Thiago Gomes from Brazil, carries out research on social-ecological change and local strategies for resource management and conservation in the Laklãnõ (Xokleng) Indigenous Territory, Upper Itajaí Valley, Santa Catarina, Brazil.

3. As Founder-Director of the non-profit organization “Planeta Océano”, GESA 2012 alum, Kerstin Forsberg from Peru, leads community-based marine research, environmental education and participatory sustainable development initiatives in Peru.