This Giving Tuesday, Will You Stand up for Land Rights Defenders?

Dear Friend,

December 1st is #GivingTuesday. For us, at the Oakland Institute, it is #StandUpForLandRightsDay to honor the courage of land rights defenders.

It is a day when we turn to you, to seek your support for continued struggles for land and life.

Forced evictions. Arbitrary arrests. And even killings. The devastation of Indigenous lands, lives, and livelihoods.

This is the true cost of fortress conservation, false climate solutions, palm oil and other agricultural plantations, and extractive industries. We have spent the last sixteen years exposing and campaigning against these so-called development schemes which destroy the lives and livelihoods of Indigenous communities, pastoralists, and small-holder farmers.

Our rigorous, independent, and fearless research and advocacy campaigns — in partnership with communities from Ethiopia, Tanzania, DRC, to Papua New Guinea and Nicaragua — have shattered the silence around human rights abuses associated with such false development paradigms and elevated their demands: respect, honor, and uphold Indigenous land rights.

That‘s why now I‘m asking you to stand with us by supporting us through a donation this Giving Tuesday.

Your tax-deductible one-time or monthly donation gives us the agility and ability to be bold and fearless, to research and advocate, and ensure victories for the communities that we’ve partnered with around the world.

It is individual donors like you who have allowed us to do this work in full independence since 2004.

We could not protect land rights defenders, support community struggles for land and livelihoods, and demand accountability from the powerful like the World Bank, without you. Whether you donated, wrote a letter to Congress, assisted with a campaign, or shared one of our campaigns on social media, you are a part of this struggle.

 

Thank you for all that you have done for the Oakland Institute and the land defenders!

In solidarity,