About Us

Cherelle is a passionate advocate for climate justice and social change. Hailing from Samoa, Tokelau and Tuvalu, she has always been passionate about uplifting stories from the Pacific. Cherelle has over 10 years experience working in the development space, specifically focusing on youth, feminism, and climate change. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Auckland and a PostGraduate Diploma in Development Studies from the National University of Samoa. As a Pacific Climate Warrior, Cherelle acknowledges the importance of weaving indigenous stories into the climate narrative. As a former Advisor for FRIDA and Regional Lead for Youth Climate Justice Fund, Cherelle has focused on supporting youth-led, grassroots organizations in the feminist and climate space.

Fahad Awan is a Fulbright Scholar and completed their masters from Columbia University, New York. They have extensively worked with philanthropic organizations to support their projects and operations all over the world. Fahad has worked in global mental health to support human right activists in East Africa, South Asia and South America, and has designed and implemented curriculums for social and emotional learning, climate justice and sustainable development in over 250 schools in emerging countries. Fahad has also worked with local governments and international organizations such as WHO to improve immunization coverage in South Asia. Through their training and work, they have specialized in supporting marginalized communities and they aspire to be a global voice for sustainable development in the years to come.

Joshua is a Ghanaian climate activist and the former Climate Lead at the Office of the UN Secretary General’s Envoy on Youth. He has over 8 years of experience working with young people on Climate Action Disaster Risk, and Resilience Building. He founded Green Africa Youth Organization (GAYO), served as a member of the IRENA Global Council on Enabling Youth Action for SDG 7, and has been an Adaptation Fellow at the Global Center on Adaptation (GCA). In the past two years, Joshua has focused on supporting grassroot youth-led organizations and is continuously engaged in the advocacy to shift climate philanthropy to youth and locally-led organizations.

Lucia is a feminist communicator and journalist specialized in gender and human rights-centered reporting and storytelling. Her work involves transforming problematic media representations of vulnerable populations and humanitarian crises. She holds a Gender Studies MA from Universidad Complutense de Madrid, has participated in conferences addressing feminist perspectives in media, and has served as an instructor on DEI in journalism. Her efforts to disseminate knowledge on gender perspective and provide DEI-focused training to newsrooms and organizations from an intersectional and decolonial approach led her to co-found the Network for Diversity in Latin American Journalism in 2022, an initiative to position communications as a platform for inclusion.

Many is a passionate advocate for climate justice, youth empowerment, and equitable resource access for marginalized communities. Her diverse experience spans from teaching, as a Fulbright Scholar, at a vocational school in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, to serving as a Program Officer at Bloomberg Philanthropies in New York City. At the Youth Climate Justice Fund, Many combines her expertise in philanthropy with her passion for supporting youth-led climate initiatives. Many is Mexican-American and currently based in Madrid, Spain. She brings a global perspective to her work, fostering connections between young climate leaders and supportive donors worldwide. Many holds a BA in Global and International Studies from Bard College and is deeply committed to creating a sustainable and just future for all.

Mercy is an intersectional African feminist with a background in International Development and Social Justice. 

She supports different Philanthropic Funds across the globe to implement a shared and collaborative approach to Grant Making that shifts power from Funders to local experts and communities, disrupting traditional grant making and management processes; towards a transformative and participatory approach to funding inclusive movements flexibly and sustainably, with a decolonial lens.

She has been part of the co-creation and drafting of the German Feminist Foreign Development Policy as well as the Dutch Feminist Foreign Policy, elaborating broad civil society perspectives on how International Development Policies should look like, focusing on inclusivity in general and specifically to women’s rights, Gender Justice and Equality towards Sustainable Development Goal (SGD) 5; and its intersections with SDG 13 towards Climate Change mitigation strategies.

She is passionate about philanthropy that is responsive and aligned to the community needs while being conscious and managing risks that come with resourcing constantly evolving and shifting contexts.

She is a young leader who has been involved in youth climate activism and advocacy through the Caribbean Youth Environment Network, a regional community of young people empowering other youth to engage in sustainable development. Mikella also supported research about youth climate movements in Trinidad and Tobago with Kairi Initiatives, a local non-profit organization. She has also worked at the Ministry of Public Utilities of Trinidad & Tobago, where she developed an interest in development financing through her work in mobilising resources for various projects. Mikella has also developed a strong interest for issues of gender equity, waste management and integrating intersectional lenses in climate work. Mikella holds a BSc. in Environmental Science and Sustainable Technology from the University of the West Indies.

Muhammad Ibrahim, a 21-year-old climate justice activist hailing from Pakistan, serves as a founding member and the Chief Operating Officer of Bunyaad Pakistan, a philanthropic organization specialising in climate justice projects. Over the past six years, he has dedicated himself to the advancement of marginalized communities and has been instrumental in spearheading initiatives aimed at promoting environmental sustainability. Ibrahim has had the opportunity to lead various climate justice projects, focusing on the development of sustainable ecosystems across Pakistan. He has worked with the local government to control the effects of climate change on a grassroot level. Ibrahim holds a BSc. in Accounting and Finance from the Lahore University of Management Science. 

Nathan is a 23-year-old climate justice & LGBTQI2S+ activist. He was one of seven members of Antonio Guterres’ Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change from 2020-2023. He founded Generation Climate Europe - the largest coalition of youth-led networks on climate and environmental issues at the European level. Nathan was also the co-chair of the youth pre-COP26 and is a former Board member of the European Environmental Bureau and Youth and Environment Europe. He is also a 776 Foundation fellow awardee. In 2020, he was nominated with 5 other young European for the “Young European of the Year 2020” award. He graduated from Sciences Po Grenoble in France and has a MA in environmental policy and regulation at the London School of Economics.

Ayshka Najib (she/her) is a climate justice activist and organizer based in the UAE. Her work focuses on ensuring the leadership and meaningful participation of those at the frontlines of the crisis and this is reflected in her advocacy with Fridays For Future MAPA (Most Affected People and Areas). She is one of the UNICEF Youth Advocates to UAE, supporting the Gulf Area Office with her expertise on climate change.

Joice Mendez is a migrant and social entrepreneur working on transboundary cooperation in the water-energy-food nexus with an emphasis on energy justice. Joice is a major voice of Latin America within leading youth and climate mechanisms, including the United Nations Secretary General’s Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change, the UNMGCY’s SDG7 Youth Constituency, the IRENA's Director- General's Global Council on Enabling Youth Action for SDG7 and the initiative Youth4Climate.

Joice co-founded several local and regional youth organizations, including the Moema Viezzer Environmental Education Observatory, the Latin American Observatory of Geopolitics of Energy, and the binational Youth Collective of the Parana Basin 3 from the Cultivating Good Water Initiative– a recipient of the UN-Water Best Practice Award in 2015. Joice has also supported Paraguay's National Conference of Youth since 2016 and the National Forum of Water and Youth, and continues to be active in YOUNGO, the Climate Reality Project América Latina, SDG7 Youth Constituency, and the Youth Adaptation Network of the Global Center on Adaptation.

Environmental sustainability advocate with exceptional leadership and professional skills having served as a programme manager, youth climate and sustainable energy champion, network weaver, researcher, facilitator and policy entrepreneur over the past 8 years. She has a proven career history in international development, futures thinking, and strategic foresight work. Passy is adept in conceptualising and effectively implementing projects, mobilising support for increased sustainable practices across sectors, creating connections, weaving collaborations across multiple stakeholders, and catalysing collective intelligence and actions to secure sustainable futures for current and future generations. She is currently the Vice-Chair of IRENA's Global Council on SDG7 and the Regional Focal Point for East and Southern Africa at the SDG7 Youth Constituency.

Social impact leader focused on providing youth engagement in energy and the climate sector. Besides, he is also a youth researcher working independently on research about technology, innovation, utilization, resource assessment, and education in renewable energy within 6 publications in total. Regarding his concern in education, he cares to help students to understand and do more in renewable energy through the society of renewable energy and him as a founder. Currently, the field of research that he works in are geothermal, solar PV, solar thermal, energy storage, innovations, and solutions. His organization, the Society of Renewable Energy (SRE), aims to accelerate Indonesia's energy transition through youth empowerment and multi-organizational collaboration.

Archana belongs to Khadia Tribe from India. She is a Climate Justice Advocate. She was the Youth Advisor to United Nations Secretary General. She was part of the First Cohort of United Nations Secretary General’s Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change, she was the only one from Asia and Indigenous among the seven members.

She holds a Masters Degree in Regulatory Governance from Tata Institute of Social Sciences Mumbai. She holds experience in research and advocacy on the rights of indigenous and local communities and Climate Action. She has been working to document, preserve and promote traditional knowledge and cultural practices of indigenous communities.

She is a member of YOUNGO, official children and youth constituency of UNFCCC . She is also a member of GYBN Global Youth Biodiversity Network , Youth Constituency of United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity.

She has been reclaiming spaces for Indigenous Peoples and local communities in the climate and biodiversity spaces, voicing their perspective and advocating for recognition and enforcement of their rights and making them an integral part of the decision making processes

Ayisha is a Pakistani human rights, climate defender and poet. She is a co-founder of Polluters Out and the Executive Director of Student Affairs at FFU. On Sept 20th, 2019 she helped mobilize and lead over 300,000 students onto the streets of Manhattan demanding their governments take climate action. Her advocacy focuses on climate justice and racial justice for BIPOC youth. She is one of the current Youth Advisors to the UN Secretary General. In early 2023, she was announced one of the Times Women of the Year 2023.

She is a Climate Justice Activist, Writer and Speaker based in the U.K. She is a coordinator in Climate Live, a youth-led organisation to harness the power of music for the planet, part of the #StopRosebank campaign. She focuses on engaging people, and demanding action from world leaders. She became an environmentalist after discovering how air pollution was impacting her community in London, and impact of rising sea levels in Jamaica. She is committed to intersectional Climate Justice. She was involved in the September 2019 climate strikes which brought 300,000 people on the streets in the U.K. She has spoken on world stages about climate justice and her activism, at events such as COP26, COP27, NY Times Hub hosted by Emma Watson alongside Malala and Greta Thunberg, Forum, at the O2 with Billie Eilish. She was named in Forbes 2020 Top U.K Environmentalists List for her work, and was honoured as a young leader at the Green Carpet Fashion Awards.

Hilda is a Ugandan climate, gender and environmental rights activist who founded Fridays for Future Uganda - a youth-led and organized global climate strike movement. Every Friday, she works toward building a safer and healthier environment by rallying governments, corporate organizations and communities to take climate action. She has visited schools around the world, mobilizing students to use their voices to make a difference. Flavia Nakabuye is also a public speaker, writer, Future Girl Rising fellow and member of the C40 Global Youth and Mayors Forum. She leads shore cleanup at Lake Victoria, empowering lakeshore communities to learn how to protect lakes and fight against plastic pollution.

Kantuta is an Aymara woman from the Plurinational State of Bolivia. She advocates for Indigenous Peoples' rights, particularly for the rights of Indigenous Women and Youth. She has advocated for the indigenous young perspective, as a member of the Red de Jóvenes Indígenas de Latino America y el Caribe (RED-LAC). She is a law student in the Universidad Mayor de San Andres. She has also participated in the 2021 International Summer Program on Indigenous Peoples’ Rights and Policy in Columbia University. She also campaigns for access to health for youth as a member of the Young Group for Health of the Pan American Health Organization. Currently, she is LAC Focal Point of the Global Indigenous Youth Caucus and Co-chair of the ILC youth platform.

Máximo Mazzocco is a climate & ecological advocate and entrepreneur. Declared Pangeist, he is a UNDP Youth Global Ambassador and a Member of Kay Pacha’s Order. In 2014, he founded Eco House Global, an Action for Sustainability non profit organization with more than 40 ongoing programes. Nowadays, he is a member the New Zero World Youth Council. Author of “Apuntes the un ambientalista” (Penguin Random House). He is founder and co-founder of several initiatives, organizations, programs, campaigns and networks. His love for animales led him to followa plant-based diet for more than 10 years.

Mitzi Jonelle Tan is a full-time climate justice activist based in Metro Manila, Philippines. She is the convenor and international spokesperson of Youth Advocates for Climate Action Philippines (YACAP), the Fridays For Future (FFF) of the Philippines. She is also an organizer with FFF International and FFF MAPA (Most Affected Peoples and Areas) making sure that voices from the Global South especially are heard, amplified, and given space. A strong voice on anti-imperialism, anti-colonization, and the intersectionality of the climate crisis, she is committed to changing the system and building a world that prioritizes people and planet, not profit, through collective action. She is also a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative champion.

Socioenvironmental defender and climate artivist from Brazil. Graduated in Law and Social Sciences, she was a Youth Advisor to the UN Secretary-General from 2020 to 2023. She still serves as Advisor in different UN Agencies and other Institutions. For the past 8 years, she acted as legal advisor to the Instituto Socioambiental, in socioenvironmental rights, including climate, indigenous and traditional peoples, being responsible for pushing the youth perspective into the organization. She co-coordinated the Working Group on Climate at the youth-led organization Engajamundo, as well as several Youth Delegations to National and International Climate Conferences. In recent years, she has focused on supporting grassroots organizations to broaden the reach of their initiatives and is continually engaged in socioenvironmental advocacy, implementing #ClimateAction and democratize more finance for on ground organizations.