GAINING A LOUDER VOICE
Abigael Kima was among the hundreds of young climate activists who gathered at COP27. She is the founder and producer of the Hali Hewa Podcast (the Swahili term for “climate”), which profiles African experts and activists to amplify local and regional “Land Hero” stories of the climate crisis. “I was so inspired by the young people who were present at COP listening to the stories of how they are impacting lives in their community,” she wrote in a LinkedIn post. During the climate conference, Kima published a daily “The COP27 Sharm El-Sheikh Series” podcast episode, interviewing people from across the globe on issues that matter to them as negotiations progress. One of these interviewees was Patricia Kombo, a youth climate activist from Kenya. She is best known for her tree-planting initiatives as part of her non-profit PaTree Initiative, which aims to attain 10 percent forest cover in Kenya by involving school pupils in tree
planting and conservation efforts. “Everything that I do, I’m doing for communities. I am doing it for them to be resilient. I’m doing it so that they can have resilient livelihoods,” said Kombo, explaining her motivation. For her work, she was named a “Hero” by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification in a campaign to distinguish “incredible young men and women who fight climate change through land conservation and restoration and mobilize communities, schools and families to join the action on the ground.”
I was so inspired by the young people's stories... how they are impacting lives in their community.
Abigael Kima, founder and producer of the Hali Hewa Podcast
A detail from Shilo Shiv Suleman's hand-painted mural
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PHOTOS: UNFCCC
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