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Mini documentary depicts the resilience of indigenous peoples in Lake Chad

In this mini-documentary, Hindou Oumaru Ibrahim shares her experience growing up among the nomadic and semi-nomadic peoples of Lake Chad and how she raised her voice on world stage to defend the rights of indigenous peoples threatened by climate change.
Photo excerpt from video on Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim and the work of indigenous women in Lake Chad.
We cannot speak of human rights without speaking of rights to the environment.
Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim

Soon she understood that her local actions needed to be underpinned by a more global framework. After working with national authorities to adapt rules and regulations at a national level, she raised the voice of indigenous peoples in international forums, most notably the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP21). Together with other indigenous leaders, her activism ensured the Paris Agreement recognized for the first time traditional knowledge and created a knowledge exchange platform.

Since 2018, Ibrahim is a member of the Scientific and Technical Committee of UNESCO's project BIOsphere and Heritage of Lake Chad (BIOPALT). The project includes a wide range of activities from setting up an early warning system for droughts and floods to restoring degraded ecosystems such as spawning grounds or sand dunes. Particular attention is also paid to income-generating activities through the promotion of green economy and the valorization of the basin's natural resources linked notably to the production of spirulina and the farming of Kouri cow (Bos taurus longifrons) - an endemic species that plays an important role in social cohesion. 

In the celebrations of its 50th anniversary, UNESCO's Man and the Biosphere Programme will be releasing a series of mini-documentaries featuring the lives of people in their struggle for a more harmonious living with nature. As the motto of the celebration states: it's about life!