Women's Earth and Climate Summit

From September 20th to 23rd, the International Women’s Earth and Climate Summit is taking place in New York, USA. One hundred women leaders are gathering together from the Global South and Global North to draft a Women’s Climate Action Agenda. It is time for female voices to be heard in the right places. Women have been the sustainers of their communities, women have been the nurturers of future generations always. Each garden we plant, each community we build is a cultivation of our future. The time to act is now – we have to find global solutions for a global shift.

Kosha Anja Joubert and Rosemary Olive Mbenie are representing the GEN networks at this gathering. The Summit was opened with a blessing by Janice Turner, indigenous representative of the Lenape tribe, who have inhabited this area of the Hudson Valley for over 10.000 years. A conversation by Amy Goodman, journalist and founder of Democracy Now!, with Dr. Jane Goodall from the Jane Goodall Institute, and Dr. Vandana Shiva from Navdanya, India, set the tone with a combination of stark frankness and loving softness. Some of the conclusions: None of the devastation we are witnessing would be taking place if democracy was allowed to work. And there is not one solution – we know about the dangers of monoculture – all of us need to bring our unique piece of the puzzle.

Sitting here amongst this wealth of woman leaders from all over the world, I am moved. As Grandmother Casey Camp-Horinek from the Poca tribe says, we need to change our understanding of what power is. The true powers of this world are Father Sun, Mother Moon, the Earth, the Water, the Fire, the Air. All of these come together in us. We need to stop taking them for granted and start giving thanks and taking up our full responsibility as caretakers.

I see part of my role here in bringing in the importance of communities as focal points of taking concrete actions and of ecovillages as becoming living and learning centres for climate mitigation and adaptation.
Please follow the proceedings at http://www.youtube.com/user/IWECI