The Keepers of the Earth Fund (KOEF) is proud to announce that in 2023 we awarded over half one million {dollars} in small grants to help Indigenous tasks on points associated to group empowerment for land defense and autonomy; the transmission of Indigenous knowledge; traditional medicine and Indigenous spirituality; meals sovereignty and Indigenous economies; and the varied types of resistance to mining for the vitality transition.
In complete, 68 Indigenous tasks and collectives had been financed for a complete quantity of $512,267. The funds had been despatched on to Indigenous communities, collectives, and grassroots organizations in 21 international locations.
At Cultural Survival, we worth cultivating long-term relationships with our companions. Subsequently, we awarded 22 grants to organizations that had obtained grants in prior years, representing one-third of this yr’s complete. Following our programmatic precedence of supporting Indigenous girls and youth, 16 organizations led by Indigenous girls and 9 tasks both led by or immediately supporting Indigenous youth had been financed.
The Keepers of the Earth Fund is an Indigenous-led fund at Cultural Survival designed to help Indigenous Peoples’ advocacy and group growth tasks globally. Since 2017, we’ve supported 306 tasks in 41 international locations via small grants and wrap-around help totaling $1,571,969. Grants go on to Indigenous communities, collectives, organizations, and conventional governments to help tasks designed by them and in accordance with their Indigenous values. Predicated on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Cultural Survival makes use of a rights-based strategy in our grantmaking methods to help grassroots Indigenous options via the equitable distribution of sources to Indigenous communities.
Meet our grant companions working to safe meals sovereignty and strengthen Indigenous economies.
Las Delicias Botanical Backyard Affiliation – (Misak), Colombia
Las Delicias Botanical Backyard Affiliation was based in 1999 by a gaggle of households from the Guambia Indigenous reserve within the division of Cauca. Confronted with environmental issues and the dearth of a land coverage that prioritizes group resolution making, they created the primary excessive altitude botanical backyard. This yr, with the help of the Keepers of the Earth Fund, the staff will strengthen the backyard’s analysis processes round meals sovereignty and Misak artisan expressions. Work will probably be performed in conventional orchards, an herbarium, and through household mingas (gatherings).
A lot’ Kanan I’inaj Seed Collective – (Maya), Mexico
Semillas A lot’ Kanan I’inaj is a collective made up of campesinos and Maya folks from the municipality of Bacalar within the state of Quintana Roo. Since 2002, they’ve been working to avoid wasting native seeds and promote the milpa system. Native seeds include the reminiscence of the folks and assure meals autonomy, and the advance of agribusiness within the territory and the rising use of genetically modified seeds represents a severe danger of cross contamination. Their challenge, supported by a KOEF grant, focuses on the manufacturing of native seeds with technical coaching at ch’il (dwell seed banks). As well as, group areas will probably be organized with a give attention to defending the territory and meals autonomy, together with a group assembly for the safety of the seeds.
Affiliation of Producers of Seeds and Andean Dietary Meals Mushuk Yuyay – (Cañari), Ecuador
The Mushuk Yuyay Affiliation is made up of producers from Cañar, El Tambo, Suscal, and Biblian within the province of Cañar. The Affiliation has 50 lively members and an extra 70 producers devoted to the manufacturing of tubers and grains. For 20 years, the Cañari group has confronted threats from monoculture and cattle ranching, which have affected native biodiversity and native seeds. With the help of a KOEF grant, the affiliation is organizing the Muyu Competition based on the agricultural calendar to advertise Cañari meals tradition, information, group group, management, and creative expression.
Camentsa Shnan Wabuatmeng Indigenous Affiliation – (Kamëntšá), Colombia
Camentsa Shnan Wabuatmeng is an Indigenous group run by specialised healers often known as sobanderas, together with conventional docs, medical college students, and trainees. Their territory is threatened by the growth of monocultures and the overuse of chemical substances that contaminate the water and the surroundings and are negatively impacting native agriculture and meals techniques. In response, the Affiliation is working to advertise the participation of kids, youth, and adults in numerous mingas (gatherings) the place information, seeds, and meals are shared. The mingas will give attention to three areas: work, to arrange conventional recipes and change information about diet; thought, to share the experiences of native households; and cultural coaching, to advertise the mom tongue, work within the jajañ (backyard), and the artwork of weaving.
Mañica Indigenous Group – (Quechua), Bolivia
The Mañica group is positioned in Potosí, Nor Lípez province, on the shores of Salar de Uyuni, the world’s largest salt flat. Confronted with shortages of water and meals, group members are growing a challenge to seize water and set up irrigation networks of their greenhouse, the place they develop greens freed from agrochemicals for consumption by the group. By these actions, they search to advertise meals and financial sovereignty of their group.
Group Xch’ool Ixqilal/Coronary heart of a Girl – (Q’echi’), Guatemala
The Xch’ool Ixqilal group was fashioned to have interaction in group growth, strengthen meals sovereignty, and increase the household financial system via the work of ladies. This yr, girls are being skilled within the processing and preparation of flour and meals. A gathering of ladies and farmers can be being organized to change information about planting tubers and different native species, which can promote the sale of native produce within the native market and contribute to feeding the group.
Collective Milpa KM50 – (Maya), Mexico
The Milpa Colectiva is made up of 23 Maya folks from the José María Morelos group in Quintana Roo. Authorities applications selling genetically modified seeds, fertilizers, and pesticides have resulted in a lack of variety of native maize and fewer planting of milpas. This downside is accentuated by the rise in migrants in search of employment outdoors of the group and the dearth of arms to domesticate the fields. Following a number of years of recovering information on conventional milpa cultivation, with the help of a KOEF grant, the collective will maintain the primary Native Seed Competition to advertise the change of native seeds and campesino information about stewardship of the land, each of that are important to sustaining their meals sovereignty and autonomy as Maya Peoples.
U Yits Ka’an Ecological Agriculture Faculty of Maní – (Maya), Mexico
U Yits Ka’an was based in 1995 by a community of campesinos from totally different cities within the south and east areas of Yucatan. This yr, they’re working to contain their youth community in studying, observing, and decoding the xook ok’íin (conventional climate forecasting methods). They are going to doc the work through video and audio and can arrange conferences with milperos (milpa producers) to advertise the change of experiences of agricultural methods. The target is to cross on Indigenous information and preserve the meals autonomy of the Maya communities as an act of group resilience within the face of local weather change.
Caño Guama Group of Alto Sipapo – (Uwuottuja), Venezuela
The inhabitants of the Caño Guama group have created an affiliation to enhance the productiveness of their lands in stability with the surroundings and to enhance the socioeconomic circumstances of their group. This area has an extended custom of rising cocoa and different native species as a substitute for the newer monoculture of plantains and tubers. In 2023, with the help of the Keepers of the Earth Fund, they’re conducting coaching workshops to enhance their meals manufacturing and different actions to help native growers.
Quilombo Rio dos Macacos Resistance Affiliation – (Quilombola), Brazil
The Quilombola Folks in Simões Filho, Bahia, have been tormented by fixed violence since 1960 when the Brazilian authorities began massacring and torturing group members and seized their territories with the usage of navy pressure. As a part of the group’s reconstruction work, the Affiliation has created a cassava flour manufacturing area, which helps to enhance the group’s meals safety and financial sovereignty.
Group of Indigenous Girls Weaving Reminiscences and Alli Biayëng Affiliation – (Kamentsa, Inga), Colombia
The Group of Indigenous Girls Weaving Reminiscences and Alli Biayëng Affiliation promote the transmission of Indigenous information and languages, protection of territory, collective rights, and environmental stewardship. With the help of KOEF, they may interact collectively in cultivating chagra (farmland) and weaving as areas for intergenerational mingas (gatherings). Their challenge is being carried out by the Kamëntsá Inga Council of San Francisco, Putumayo, Colombia.
Zienzele Basis – (Shona), Zimbabwe
Cyclical drought has induced misery and hardship for the Shona inhabitants of Mupagamuri, Chikofa, Chamatutu, Mawadze, and Mudzai villages in Zimbabwe, who don’t have any entry to wells when their rivers run dry. The Zienzele Basis, in continuation of a earlier challenge, began work on three borehole wells to serve the group’s ingesting water and irrigation wants at the area people heart. The wells will contribute to Shona meals safety by making certain that crops stay irrigated throughout the dry season.
