ABOUT US

Oureratou Quedraogo, MA – Environmental economist, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso for Africa

National Coordinator for Burkina Faso for the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA); President of African Network on Gender Equality and Sustainable Development (ANGEL_SD); Deputy Executive Coordinator, Africa Youth Initiative on Climate Change.

Combines expertise in gender issues and climate change; her work integrates sustainability and gender considerations into development policies and programs.

At PACJA, she leads the African Activists for Climate Justice program in Burkina Faso, striving to empower women, youth, and local indigenous communities to defend their rights and live dignified lives in a sustainable environment amidst the climate crisis. Oureratou strongly advocates for improving African women’s access to climate finance, viewing it as essential for community resilience. She has a Master’s in Economics, option Macroeconomics, and Development Management. Quote: “ANGEL_SD’s believes that liberating women is key to liberating humanity”.

Source: Tree Aid, Bristol, UK, “7 Inspiring African Women Who Have Helped the Climate Crisis”, 8 May 2024, https://www.treeaid.org/blogs-updates/7-inspiring-african-women-who-have-helped-the-climate-crisis/

Maria Belén Páez, MA – Ecologist, Quito, Ecuador for South America

President and Executive Director, Fundación Pachamama; General Secretary, Amazon Sacred Headwaters Initiative

Coordinates the climate finance and forests areas of the foundation. A specialist in climate change, the Amazon, and indigenous peoples’ rights, she is also general secretary of the Amazon Sacred Headwaters Initiative, which aims to protect 35 million hectares in collaboration with Amazonian indigenous federations. For 25 years, Páez has led the implementation of programs based on forest economies, ecotourism, renewable energies, conservation of fragile ecosystems, and legal actions in defense of collective rights and the rights of nature, climate justice. She is a board member of Protection International and the National Environmental Fund of Ecuador, and an active member of the Science Panel for the Amazon. In 2021, she was named to the list of the 100 Latinos Most Committed to Climate Action.

Source: The Aspen Institute, Washington D.C., “Aspen Ideas Festival”, https://www.aspenideas.org/speakers/belen-paez

Dr. Payal Parekh – Climate Justice Activist, Bern (CH) for Asia

Payal Parekh, born in Mumbai (India), earned her Ph.D. in chemical oceanography at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in 2003.  After a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Position at the University of Bern, Payal began working as a campaigner at international NGOs.  From 2013-2018 she was the International Programme Director at the climate campaigning organisation, 350.org. Since then she has worked as a consultant, supporting NGOs and grassroots movements across the globe to develop strategic campaigns to fight the fossil fuel industry and develop socially, economically and ecologically sustainable alternatives. She is an expert on social change strategies incorporating organising and mobilising tools to build power, and is a sought after speaker, writer and trainer on the subject. She believes strongly in the ability of people power to resist and affect change. 

Dr. Silja Klepp – Professor of Human Geography, Kiel, Germany for Europe

UNESCO Chair for integrated marine science, Department of Geography, Kiel University.

Silja Klepp has been Professor of Social Dynamics in Coastal and Marine Areas at Kiel University since 2017. She is co-founder of the “EnJust” network, which raises awareness of environmental justice issues and strengthens the democratic participation of those affected by environmental problems. Her current research in the Central Pacific and Sicily focuses on climate change adaptation and climate justice. Her work focuses on human-environment relations in the Anthropocene, in particular the social consequences of climate change, environmental justice and socio-ecological transformation. Her current research focuses on erosion on the coasts of Sicily, where she is investigating and developing transformative approaches to climate adaptation. Prof. Klepp also uses transdisciplinary and artistic approaches. Full member of European Academy of Sciences and Arts (EASA) since April 2024, of the Academy of Sciences in Hamburg since October 2024. Book (ed., with J. Hein): Umweltgerechtigkeit und sozialökologische Transformation. Konflikte um Nachhaltigkeit im deutschsprachigen Raum, Bielefeld: Transcript, 2024 (Environmental justice and socio-ecological transformation. Conflicts over sustainability in German-speaking countries).

Sources: Kiel University, Klima Konzept 2030, https://www.klik.uni-kiel.de/de/interviews/prof-dr-silja-klepp; Kiel University, News (November 2024) www.uni-kiel.de/de/universitaet/detailansicht/news/177-silja-klepp

Dr. Angele Alook – Assistant Professor, York University, Toronto, Canada for North America

Assistant Professor in the School of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies at York University. As a member of Bigstone Cree Nation in Treaty 8 territory, her research has mainly focused on the political economy of oil and gas in Alberta. She specializes in Indigenous feminisms, life course approaches, Indigenous research methodologies, cultural identity, and the sociology of family and work. She is a co-investigator on the SSHRC-funded (Partnership Grant) Corporate Mapping Project, where she completed research with the Parkland Institute on Indigenous experiences in Alberta’s oil industry and its gendered impact on working families. Angele is also a member of the Just Powers research team, a SSHRC-funded Insight Grant. Angele is a member of the Just Powers research team, which is a SSHRC-funded Insight Grant. Through the Just Powers project Angele has been able to produce a documentary called “Pikopaywin: It is broken” which features stories on the land with Indigenous traditional land users, environmental officers, and elders. She is directing her research toward a just transition of Alberta’s economy and labour force and the impact climate change has on traditional Treaty 8 territory. Latest co-authored book: The End of This World: Climate Change in So-Called Canada, Toronto: Between the Lines, 2023.

Source: York University, https://www.yorku.ca/cfr/why-environmental-activism-needs-indigenous-feminism/

Cathryn Eatock, MA – Founder and Co-Chair, Indigenous Peoples’ Organisation-Australia, Sydney, Australia for Australia / Oceania / Pacific Region

Former Co-Chair and Pacific Member of the Facilitative Working Group (FWG), Local Communities & Indigenous Peoples Platform (LCIPP), United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

Cathy Eatock is a Gayiri and Badtjala woman, whose people come from central Queensland, Australia. She is the founder of the “Indigenous Peoples’ Organisation-Australia” (IPOA), the peak national Indigenous rights advocacy body in Australia. She brings an extensive history of Indigenous advocacy extending over 35 years, including a central role in the Committee to Defend Black Rights, which successfully campaigned for the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. Cathryn Eatock established the Aboriginal Rights Coalition in 2007 and has also focused on Aboriginal women’s rights, as CEO of Mudgin-Gal Aboriginal Women’s Centre in Redfern and as the NSW state representative to the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women’s Alliance.

She was Senior Policy Officer in Aboriginal Affairs NSW 2004-2012, where she conveyed Indigenous community concerns on justice, reparations, environmental and cultural concerns, Indigenous languages, health and self-determination, to the NSW Government.

She attended the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues annually from 2011–2023 and has led Australia’s delegations from 2016. She has also presented at the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples annually since 2016, attended Sustainable Development Forums, presented to the Human Rights Council and presented as a panelist at the Commission on the Status of Women. In March 2022, she was elected as the Pacific Representative to the FWG and since her appointment has supported Indigenous delegates to attend COP27, COP28 and supported the hosting of the Pacific Regional Gathering in 2023. More recently Cathy hosted an Indigenous Decision-Making Workshop, in May 2024, to develop 16 community determined climate mitigation, adaptation and capacity building projects.

Eatock has completed a Master of Human Rights and is currently a PhD Candidate at the University of Sydney, where she is examining the United Nations capacity to support the assertion of Indigenous self-determination within nation states.

Source: UN, LCIPP, https://lcipp.unfccc.int/facilitative-working-group-fwg/lcipp-facilitative-working-group

Lorena E. Olarte, MA

Lecturer in international politics, editorial board member at the Journal für Entwicklungspolitik, and member of the Latin America Research Network at the Institute of Political Science, University of Vienna. Her research focuses on political ecology, Communication – Journalism at UNAM and earned a Master’s degree in Political Science and Sustainable Development from Sciences Po Paris. She is currently pursuing a PhD in Political Science at the University of Vienna. Her academic work has been supported by UNAM, Conahcyt, the MacArthur Foundation, the University of Vienna, and Literar Mechana.

Dr. Brototi Roy

political ecologist and ecological economist; at present Beatriu de Pinós  post-doctoral researcher at Institute of Environmental Science and Technology (ICTA) of the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Her research focus is on socio-ecological transformations, decoloniality and degrowth. For her PHD, she researched environmental justice movements against coal in East India. Interested in action-oriented research for socio-ecological justice and equity. Co-Founder of “Degrowth India Initiative” in 2015.

Dr. Michael Staudinger

climate researcher and meteorologist. Joined the Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics (ZAMG) in Vienna in 1983, and served as its director 2010 to 2021. 2010-2022 Permanent Representative of Austria with World Meteorological Organization (WMO). 2015-2019 President of ECOMET, a European meteorological data platform. Since 2018 European President of WMO. Since 2021 Senior Advisor WMO and of World Bank Group.

Dr. Mariam A. Wagialla

architect and urban planner from Sudan, resettled in Austria as a refugee in 2012 after more than 20 years with Khartoum’s Urban Development Department. She now leads DANIA for Diversity and Sustainable Development and serves as an external lecturer at the Institute of Spatial Planning, Vienna University of Technology.

Dr. Norbert Mayr, Founder

Architectural historian, urban researcher, writer, curator (Vienna)

Increased ventures into eco-social challenges and peaceful civil resistance

After decades as an academic (art history), writer and publicist, he initiated the MGG22 residential estate in Vienna-Stadlau, as an entrepreneur with technical expertise. Years before its completion in 2019, it was highlighted as a game-changer in the housing energy supply – according to the IBA Vienna on the topic of New Social Housing. After years of very slow decarbonisation, Vienna is now embracing the renewable energy supply-based MGG22 principles, particularly for new housing and public buildings. These principles of geothermic “passive cooling” can be further developed for many regions of the Global South, which are particularly affected by environmental collapse.

The construction sector in developed countries, the largest polluter of the environment and climate (outpacing traffic), has already released vast amounts of greenhouse gases that drive global warming. In environmental movements such as LobauBleibt!, Mayr is committed against anachronistic  motorway and tunnel projects, for a mobility and construction turnaround, in initiatives such as the ALLIANZ FÜR SUBSTANZ – Bestand als ökologisches Ressource against demolition, for preservation of existing buildings, for intelligent reuse.