Dear Community,
Happy Earth Day! Today we give honor to this beautiful planet that provides us all with deep love and care. A place to call home. The waters, prairies, deserts, mountain tops, forests that nourish us individually and as a community. We are Nature.

WECAN will always be here, fighting for the protection of our planet and uplifting the struggles, solutions, knowledge, and leadership of women worldwide. Please continue on in this newsletter, to learn more about our upcoming event, watch the recording of our Earth week discussion, and learn more about our response to the leaders climate summit and more!

For Mother Earth and for each other, we continue to rise.
UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues
WECAN Side Event
Tuesday, April 27, 2021
11:00am PDT / 2:00pm EDT USA Time
Please join us for this WECAN and Reacción Climática event, being held during the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII). Spanish, Portuguese and English translation will be provided during the event.

Women are essential leaders across Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), mobilizing for the protection and defense of forests and biodiversity, oftentimes leading resistance efforts to defend local territories, holding invaluable knowledge of local ecosystems, and advocating at the international level for further protection of human and Indigenous rights, forests, water, and our global climate. Please join the Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN) and Reacción Climática for “Indigenous Women Land Defenders, Protection of Nature and Human Rights, and the Escazú Agreement", an event to learn more about the Escazú Agreement— a critical new environmental policy in the LAC region. We will discuss how this vital piece of legislation can protect diverse ecosystems, the global climate, and Women Environmental and Human Rights Defenders (WEHRD) in their work to defend their rights and lands. 

During the event, women land defenders and policy advocates will highlight the challenges women face in securing human and Indigenous rights and participating in environmental and climate policy, while also sharing how the Escazú Agreement can be a powerful tool for the protection of human rights, women land defenders, local territories and communities.

Meet the Speakers
Patricia Gualinga (Kichwa), Indigenous leader from Sarayaku, Spokeswoman for Mujeres Amazónicas Defensoras de la Selva, Ecuador
María Luisa Rafael, Quechua leader, Human Rights and Environmental activist (Bolivia)
Carol Gonzáles, Organizacion de Pueblos Indígenas de la Amazonia Colombiana OPIAC (Colombia)
Carmen Capriles, Founder of Reacción Climática, WECAN Coordinator for Latin America (Bolivia)
Osprey Orielle Lake, Executive Director of the Women's Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN) International (USA)
WECAN Responds to the U.S. Climate Summit
This week, 40 world leaders came together for the US-hosted Leaders' Summit on Climate, aiming to advance climate plans that meet the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement. The summit aimed to be a critical moment for countries to pursue all efforts to limit warming to 1.5C and deliver on climate justice. We will be conducting a full analysis over the next weeks. However, what we can state today is that while governments work to advance efforts, their commitments in relation to the escalating climate crisis continue to fall far short of what is needed to meet the science of the climate emergency.

As the U.S. and other countries announce their Nationally Determined Contribution (NDCs) and governments and corporations announce "net zero" pledges, we are keenly aware of how offset schemes, market-based mechanisms, and false climate solutions are being used to maintain the power and wealth of those who are the most responsible for furthering the climate crisis. We are demanding real solutions that are community-led and call for systemic change.

We are calling for stronger commitments to shutdown fossil fuel extraction and infrastructure, and invest in renewable, regenerative energy; to explicitly include the protection of forests as a critical and viable climate solution; and for governments to strengthen gender equity and Indigenous rights in the NDCs. Please see more details below.
Build Back Fossil Free

To limit warming to 1.5°C, and meet (and exceed) the climate goals laid out in the Paris Agreement, governments must commit to ending the era of fossil fuels for good.

Extraction, pollution, colonization, and racism have poisoned our environment, our bodies, and our democracy for long enough. The Biden-Harris Administration must take urgent action to end the era of fossil fuels, and put a down payment on a healthy, thriving economy that works for all. If the U.S. wants to build back better, it must build back fossil free.

Take action today and sign on to the Build Back Fossil Free petition to demand U.S. President Biden take executive action today to shut down fossil fuels.

Uplift Women's Leadership and Gender Justice
Global feminists are demanding climate justice. We cannot afford to invest in false and harmful “solutions” to the climate crisis, and women and feminists worldwide hold the solutions, knowledges, and experiences to lead a transition to a more just and regenerative future.

As co-founders and steering committee members of the Feminist Green New Deal Coalition, we feel it is critical to center the views of frontline global South feminists in response to this week's Leaders' Summit on Climate, please learn more here.


Advocacy for gender responsive climate action is crucial in the upcoming months as countries deliver new and updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) until COP26, expected to take place at the end of this year. In advance of this week's climate summit, the Women and Gender Constituency released a short brief providing definitions and explanations on Nationally Determined Contributions in the Paris Agreement and the Katowice climate package. The brief also provides additional information and resources for gender advocacy. Please be welcome to read the full brief here.

Protect The World's Forests
Forests are critical climate solutions and cannot be left out as countries solidify their NDCs.
Global leaders must listen to Indigenous women leaders and protect the world's forests, including the Amazon Rainforest and Tongass National Forest in Alaska.

The Tongass Rainforest is the traditional homelands of the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian Peoples. It is the largest national forest in the U.S., and has been called 'America’s climate forest' due to its unsurpassed ability to sequester carbon and mitigate climate impacts. For decades however, industrial scale logging has been destroying this precious ecosystem, and disrupting the traditional lifeways, medicine, and food systems of the regions Indigenous communities. The WECAN Tongass hub, led by Indigenous women, is working to advocate for forest protection, food sovereignty, and Indigenous rights, please learn more about our efforts here.

In the Amazon, Indigenous communities continue to face threats of violence, increased covid-19 cases, and destruction of their homelands, yet they continue to rise for the defense and protection of their homelands and our entire planet. The Biden-Harris Administration has an opportunity to fulfill its climate action commitments by prioritizing forest protection nationally and abroad.

Amazon leaders, experts, and a broad range of NGOs have laid out 16 priority actions the Administration can take through the Amazon Climate Platform, which effectively meet the needs of the urgent situation in the Amazon Rainforest. WECAN is honored to be one of the endorsers of this action platform, which is based on the principles of human rights, science, transparency, support for democratic participation, and respect for the sovereign rights of Amazon countries over their territories and natural resources, including the sustainable use and development of those resources, as recognized by international law. Please read the full platform here!
Watch the Recording!
Women and Feminists Act for Climate Justice
On Monday, at the start of Earth week, WECAN hosted a powerful event, "Women and Feminists Act for Climate Justice" as part of the youth-led Powershift Convergence. Panelists shared struggles and solutions based in a climate justice framework, including forest and biodiversity protection, Indigenous rights, environmental racism, agro-ecology, food sovereignty, fossil fuel resistance, and feminist climate policy.
As governments and corporations commit to “net zero” climate pledges, we know what is needed is not more greenwashing, offset schemes, or market-based false solutions, but instead deep and rapid investment in care economics, community-led solutions, rights of nature, and women-led and feminist solutions that refuse the commodification of Nature or sacrifice people and sacrifice zones. Women are on the frontlines of climate impacts and solutions - it is time for women to be recognized as the leaders of climate action.

Speakers included:
Casey Camp-Horinek (Ponca Nation), Environmental Ambassador, WECAN Senior Project Lead/Board Member; Sharon Lavigne, environmental activist and Founder and President of RISE St. James; Monique Verdin (Houma Nation), member of Another Gulf is Possible, Director of The Land Memory Bank & Seed Exchange, and WECAN Indigenous Food Security & Sovereignty Program Coordinator; Kari Ames (Tlingit), WECAN Indigenous Women's Tongass Representative; Akhila Kolisetty, Policy and Campaigns Manager, MADRE; and comments and analysis by Osprey Orielle Lake, WECAN Executive Director.
WECAN in the Media
Please stay tuned as we continue to uplift the leadership and solutions of women worldwide fighting for climate justice and the defense of the planet for current and future generations.
For the Earth and All Generations,

Women's Earth and Climate Action Network
(WECAN) International Team
S T A Y C O N N E C T E D