Event Details

Wind Power and Indigenous Peoples: Stopping Land Grabs & Building Community Alternatives

Please join us on Thursday, October 15th from 12-2 pm Pacific for a lunch briefing. We will learn about the movement to establish a renewable energy economy that ensures the free, prior, and informed consent of Indigenous communities, and which ensures community participation and control.

We will specifically learn about the current situation and the alternatives that are being built in Mexico and Kenya, hear from community members how they are organizing to defend their land and their rights, and learn about and discuss how donors and investors can participate in this exciting new energy economy that respects community land rights, ensures community control, and reflects a solidarity economy.

Particular Issues We Will Learn About:

• The current effects of corporate wind power development on Indigenous land: land grabs, corruption and violence.

• How communities respond and organize to build an alternative model for a community-based energy transition.

• The local organizing work and processes, and how these models could inspire other movements.

• The importance of Indigenous women's organizing in creating community controlled renewable wind projects.

• The importance of wind in the cosmologies of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and how to respect the wind and sacred sites while advancing the transition to green energy.

Speakers:

Bettina Cruz Velázquez - organizer in the Assembly of Indigenous Peoples of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in Defense of Land and Territory, member of the Mexican Network of Women Defenders of Human Rights.

Abdikadir Kurewa - organizer from Loiyangalani, member of the Sarima Indigenous Peoples Land Forum, has experience as organizer with Kivulini Trust and Friends of Lake Turkana, amongst others (joining by skype).

Sergio Oceransky - Director of The Yansa Group, Ashoka-Lemelson Fellow, former co-ordinator of the World Wind Energy Institute.

Moderated by Karen Swift- Swift Foundation

Who should attend?

• Anyone interested in investing and participating in an equitable, regenerative, renewable economy.
• Foundations and donors interested in impact investing, or who fund Indigenous and social justice movements.
• Activists who work on energy reform, social justice and equitable economy issues.
• Investors who can apply shareholder pressure on any renewable energy investments that may be involved in some of these land grabs.

This will be an incredibly interesting conversation.

Please RSVP by Friday, October 9th to karen@swiftfoundation.org

Co-sponsored by:

Swift Foundation, International Funders for Indigenous Peoples, Confluence Philanthropy, and EDGE Funders Alliance.

Delicious food will be served!