CHANGE STARTS HERE: An Earth Day Celebration

[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] to me nature is home and universal to be respected by everyone i'm speaking up for nature and it's preservation so that future generations can enjoy it whether i'm walking in nature or i'm walking in the city i'm constantly reminded by the beautiful world that we're so lucky to live in and i'm inspired to protect it in any way that i can one story can open a heart individual voices have power and they can make change when we use our voices together we make progress we make history so we must speak up for nature like our future depends on it because it does hello everyone happy earth day welcome to our virtual celebration change starts here my name is jennifer morris the ceo of the nature conservancy and i'm so excited to be your host today for the next two hours this earth day in fact every day it's critical to acknowledge the original owners of the lands where we live today i'm here in arlington virginia near washington dc on the traditional and ancestral homelands of the nucochec people sometimes referred by the anglicized term the anacostine and the piscataway peoples now if you'd like to learn more about the traditional stewards of your home please visit native land dot ca that's native dash land dot ca please check it out and for those of you that live in or are visiting washington dc i just learned about yesterday a really cool new app it's called the guide to indigenous dc and it has a walking tour of 17 key historical sites from local indigenous history but also important sites of indigenous art and activism now over the next two hours you're going to meet some really incredible people leading innovative inspiring work all across the globe and one of them is the incredible catherine hey ho who will be my co-host for today and has recently accepted the position as our new chief scientist hello catherine welcome hi jen so great to have you i'm so excited to be kicking off my first earth day as the ceo of the nature conservancy alongside our first ever female chief scientist catherine what is it like for you to be here today and to hear yourself introduced that way well before i jump into how it feels to me i want to acknowledge that i am next to the very first female ceo of the nature conservancy as well this is such a great time for both of us and for the future of our organization so earth day feels like a birthday party for all of us because every single one of us depends on this planet for life without earth we wouldn't exist we literally depend on it for the air that we breathe if you just take a breath right now the water we drink the food we eat the resources we use for everything that we have it all comes from this planet so while we often feel like we have to be a certain type of person to care about climate change the reality is we only have to be a human living on planet earth we are all that and that's what the nature conservancy is all about it's not about working only with certain people or certain parts of the world it's about working with everyone because a healthy planet is good for us all so now that you know i have to ask you the same question what is it like for you being here today as our first ever female ceo and what does earth day mean to you ah thanks so much for that question so it i have to say it's just absolutely amazing it's an incredible feeling to be here to celebrate earth day alongside the tnc incredible team and all of you out there our community of supporters it's because of you that we've been so successful over the years so i've spent the first few months 11 months really now it's less than a year that i've been on the job as ceo and i've really spent that time immersing myself in our work around the world and i have to say it's just been so inspiring even though around the world and covent of course means and on zoom it's still i've been able just to learn so much and meet so many of the incredible people that work for the nature conservancy or that support the nature of conservancy so to me earth day is really a reminder of how and why i chose to be an environmental conservation as my career and i'll tell you just a very short story about 28 years ago i can't believe it's been 28 years i was teaching english in a very small village in northern namibia in southern africa and while i was working on a women's development project and while helping the women there i would spend my weekends collecting firewood and digging boreholes to find water i began to realize then really the deep connection between human health and planetary health at the time when i was there in the early 90s deforestation was exacerbating a devastating drought and making it harder and harder for the community to actually find water and the consequences of this was really falling mostly to women and so that's when i decided to dedicate my career to protecting nature and to help better the lives of everyone who depends on nature for their own survival so catherine let's turn back to your story so you are an esteemed climate scientist and you're known all across the world for your work and communication around climate change in fact you were recently featured in people magazine can we please show that spread please wow look at that that's incredible so people magazine featured you and not many scientists can really say that for one that they were featured in people magazine you had this incredible ability katherine to shift gears from publishing peer-reviewed academic papers to people magazine so tell us what led you to add communicator to your impressive science resume well so often if you think you're reading a story about climate change you think it belongs in maybe scientific american or the green living magazine that's at the checkout counter in your local organic grocery store and those of course are great places to talk about climate change but as i said before climate change is an everything issue it affects every single one of us here on this planet it affects our health and our well-being and although we tend to think of it as a separate issue it's actually at the core of all the issues we care about today whether it's poverty or hunger whether it's justice or equality whether it's simply knowing that my child will grow up having clean air to breathe and clean water to drink so i was absolutely delighted that we are starting to see this conversation move beyond the circles of those of us who are already concerned about it to circles of people who might not think they're the type of person to care but it turns out they are because again if they're a human they're exactly the right person to care absolutely clearly as you said climate change is an everyone and everything issue and it's encouraging to know that as we speak on earth day right now the byte administration is gathering leaders from across the globe to galvanize efforts by the major economies to tackle the crime climate crisis just this morning the administration released its new paris agreement targets which aim to cut u.s carbon pollution by 50 percent or more by the end of the decade in nine years a strong commitment that nearly doubles the us's previous commitment under the obama administration and will accelerate the transition to cleaner energy cleaner transportation and other investments that we need i know at the nature conservancy we're incredibly encouraged by this it's a step forward on the policy front for sure but thinking more broadly catherine what are three things you want our viewers to know today when it comes to addressing climate change well the most important thing is this everyone has a role to play you don't have to be a president or prime minister or a ceo of an organization or a scientist to help we need system-wide solutions but a system is made up of individuals individuals who understand that the world can and should be different that we have a problem it's real it's urgent it's here and now but we can fix it there are solutions and working together we can get there starting with using our voice to advocate for change in our social circles our place of work or worship our school our neighborhood that is so important it's the number one thing we're not doing that every one of us could do looking at how we can protect this planet that we live on our natural environment our air and our water our local parks and natural areas and again engaging at every single level we truly can make a difference the world has changed before and it's time for the world to change again that's fantastic and you're going to hear today everyone that's listening a story is full of people doing incredible work around the world and and catherine we want all of our viewers today to walk away with that sense of hope and inspiration can you tell us a little bit about what gives you hope these days well that is the number one question that i am asked every single day in fact i've already been asked it twice today and that's because the news doesn't give us hope what we see just gives us it makes us angry or frustrated or fearful or discouraged so what does give us hope it turns out that seeing other people act recognizing we are not alone this problem of climate change and protecting our planet it's not a giant boulder sitting at the bottom of the hill with only a few hands on it that boulder is already at the top of the hill it's already rolling down in the right direction it's got millions of hands on it and we have to get more on it to get it going faster so recognizing that we are not alone that there are so many people that you're going to hear all about during this broadcast amazing people all over the world making a difference we just need your hand on that boulder too that's fantastic that is a perfect segue to our first guest catherine so let's go ahead and jump in so i am so delighted to introduce our first guest today beatrice lampara beatrice is the production manager for beadworks in kenya where she's calling in from today and beadworks currently works with over 1200 women in nine conservancies empowering these women to earn more money creating traditional handicrafts than they would from other work that can have harmful impacts on the environment in fact this beautiful necklace i'm wearing today came from the women of beadworks but before we talk to beatrice about her amazing work let's watch this short film about one of beadworks beaters joyce lau kai koko foreign [Music] foreign [Music] bye [Music] foreign [Music] beatrice it's so lovely to meet you thanks so much for being here today so we just heard joyce's incredible story now i want to ask you a few questions but i also want to get our live audience involved so any of you out there if you have a question please put your question in chat and we'll do our best to get to it beatrice first yes thank you for being here can you tell us a little bit about yourself uh thank you jennifer and happy earth day such a privilege to be here to speak about our work from northern kenya i was born and raised in northern kenya basically in one of the villages uh where we have the community conservancies a community conservancy is a situation where community comes together and define how to use their land and basically in one of the community conservancies that's where i was raised i was raised in a pastoral society where i had the privilege to go to school it's not uh during our years back then it was not an obvious thing to go to school but my family back then just me to go to school and because my community had a community conservancy they then supported me to go through campus university college life and then after that that's when i went back to work as a conservancy manager and while working as a conservacy manager i had the opportunity to look at what happens within a community a community conservancy and that really inspired me to have a dream of engaging women as a part of the conservacy and that's how i joined uh i had the dream of becoming part of bid works well now i understand that you actually came to beadworks in 2015 and the program was not quite what it is today could you uh could you tell us a little bit about what you've done to improve and grow beadwork since you've been there beatrice there did we lose you okay i lost you for a second sorry about that i can hear you now so i was asking um what you when you came to beadworks in 2015 it was quite different so how did you help grow the organization to what it is now so in 2015 when i came to beadworks things were really not as easy as they look now we had about 600 women who were struggling to provide what the market wanted and we had customers who are not happy with the whole production system so in 2015 i came in and really tried to understand what's going on and basically i went out there to sit with the women try to understand their issues and i had the privilege and still have the privilege of being able to speak both english understand what the customers want and also being able to go out to the women sit down with them come together and come up with solutions some of the problems that we initially had was our production process took longer and by sitting down with the women we came up with solutions to find ways of fasting the process because we'll then ask the women how do we ensure that we fulfill what the customers want but at the same time how do we address the challenges that the women had and one of the issues that the women didn't really understand is who was the end customer and what does the end market require how do we communicate that and by being able to participate in the trade fairs and markets and speaking to the women then we came up with solution that was women driven and the women were not just passive participants they were active in the production system and understanding the market and basically we are able to then increase the number of women from the 600 to 1300 and not just women who are out there they are entrepreneurs because now they form smaller networks within their villages and this these women in the villages then supervise how the whole production happens and the whole production is based on relationship it's based on uh settlement and it then makes things easier and over time we've been able to have meetings where women don't just talk about beats we have forums where we discuss about what happens in a community conservancy we are forums where women share their journey we have forums where women inspire others where women talk about their dreams and over the years we've been i have been part of a process that women are able to aspire to see their children go through school so i have been able to see them dream of you know having a nice house like what joy's video showed us i have women who've taken their daughters and sons through university and now through the partnership with the nature conservancy and all other donors and our customers we are at a level where women are confident enough to make products that are you know can go into global market can be you know anyone can be can get a quality product that can serve you and at the same time they are able to contribute that into their conservatives because how the model works is you have uh we call them star bidders or entrepreneurs at the village level who then supervise production after the sales we have conservation fees that goes to the conservacy so imagine this feeling of women being able to hand over a check to their community the joy and the pride that we are not just um we are not just out there as women who would otherwise not be recognized but we are part of a a network a community ecosystem that is going to protect the environment through our financial contribution but at the same time by being able to support their conservatives their families are getting recognition they are now being invited into gracing committees they are being able they are now recognized to participate in all forms of um community organizations and it all began by just sitting down with them under the trees having this conversation what are the issues how do we come up with the solutions and you know at the end of the day solutions come from you know us that in those conversations sitting and listening and basically being deliberate in addressing the needs of of the people and then uh giving this platform for us to share our journey together now we have a bigger dream of you know going global going into digital market and it's all done at the village level nothing is factory it's not um you know women work during their free time they coordinate all the production they all need they just understand that we need these things done this time by these um colors they get all the instructions about the value chain but at the same time it's so easy and flexible flexible to fit in into their daily lives wow beatrice that is amazing and i have to tell you that um i've gotten so many compliments on this necklace so you've clearly done an incredible job of sharing what the market wants um and and bringing that back to your community and and also your story about it's not just about the products of course it's about empowering women can you talk a little bit more about the connection with the environment you started to touch on that but you know the nature conservancy is a partner and tell us a little bit more about how building the confidence of women and through their businesses also helps the environment okay thank you i'll just give a quick overview how the northern landscape looks like so it's basically arid and semi-arid so it's um a space that uh vulnerable to drought you know resource-based conflict and then so when you think about the natural space itself it's difficult it's it's not easy so ideally these women uh and also just the the cultural setup does not give women many opportunities to to earn an income so with beadworks it basically gives them a chance to earn an income through bids beat sale which is not necessarily um you know like based on rainfall and all that and then that's also prevents them from doing other harmful practices like you know what joyce mentioned in our own video that some will cut down trees and make charcoal to be able to make some money and with with this setup then they are able to earn an income they are able to support their children to go through school and just coming together then they are also uh have a voice as collective members of our community to challenge by them contributing to a conservacy then they have a voice to ask the board or the manager or the chairman how the the funding or the the resources they contribute to our conservation is going to be used within our community conservancy thinking about their participation in boards then they are part of um a leadership that can decide how are we going to manage our intelligence how are we going to manage uh to protect our wildlife how are we going then to to ensure that we we we keep um our wildlife our environment you know safe for everybody and for long term so it it it it's it's in different levels there's a household level where they're able to support their family through bringing in income they're also part of a community where they're able to you know keep uh give their voice into how things are going to be managed but also just in the long term by having the ability to to to take their children through school when i think about my own journey and how i i went to school first of all it's through my own mother and i own effort and i got inspired by what our own conservacy and community did it allowed me to go to school and i came back to be a champion and now work with more women over a thousand women who in so many ways um i i when we have internships we have children from these women we have we we are mentoring so it's a whole network through just a simple it looks like a simple process but it's complex because it's just it's more than the best it's about the relationships it's about the network it's about building people's um you know the confidence of women to speak up uh and giving them that chance to fully participate and understand what is happening in the global space that is fantastic so you touched on this a little bit but um before we go to live questions and please if you have any questions for beatrice please put them in chat now um you you know tell us a little bit about um you know what inspires you i mean you're doing just such an amazing work i imagine the women that you work with inspire you but but what else inspires you about the work that you're leading i am inspired by the work that i do because one i believe that change happens when people really participate and the work i do allows me to engage with individuals allows me to speak to people so the nature of the work itself is inspiring and by being able to see women meet a woman who could not even speak before people or a woman walks to me and say i was able to achieve this i was able to do this gives me a lot of inspiration but more importantly i'm also a mother to two beautiful girls so i want them to dream you know to be able to think of you know a space that they are able to achieve their potential i i am inspired to see a better northern kenya you know and northern kenya where people are able to fully participate and and and define and appreciate and you know shape how the uh our future will look like for our own children so i am inspired by so many things the women my own mama my my own children and just the landscape the environment that we live in that is fantastic um i i also have a a 13 year old daughter and and while we're not in beautiful kenya um she does the same thing for me that inspiration you get to do the best you can every day for the people around you it really is incredible so it looks like we do have a question here um let me see if i can get it um let's see hold on one second i can't see the question guys okay here we go um oh so we heard from from a woman named sheila who says that she's watching live on youtube and she loves the bracelets and uh the lanyards that she's seen from beadworks so if you are out there and you're interested in and buying some of the products from this incredible um organization in kenya how would you go about that beatrice so at the moment we have a website um which has the contact information so you you'll be able to reach out to us through that but in the next few days we'll be having a new website where we'll be able to order directly we're just finalizing a few things but you can get in contact with us through our website and follow us on our social media platforms yeah wonderful okay great well thank you so much i really appreciate um you being with us and sharing your story it's incredibly inspirational and um thanks again and we wish you all the best um we're gonna turn it back now to catherine who's going to introduce our next guests thank you i hope that you were as inspired as i was by hearing about beatrice's work i just love how the work of bead works and many other organizations empower women helps them improve their personal finances their ability to support their family feed our kids confidence community and the environment at the same time it's a win-win-win and did you know that one of many solutions to climate change project drawdown is a great resource for that if you haven't checked it out yet one key solution to climate change is the education and empowerment of women and girls and i have to say that that's one of my personal favorites well now i have the privilege of introducing our next speakers they are actor justin long and tmc's own forest watershed manager catherine schlegel justin cares deeply about the environment and climate change and he's going to be talking to catherine about her innovative research on restoring forests and her work across the western u.s if you remember 2020 was a record-breaking wildfire season out west the apocalyptic orange skies the choking smoke that people had to breathe where does climate change come in it's drying out our soils and our vegetation so when a fire starts as it typically does due to accidental ignition it burns much greater area than it would have 50 or 100 years ago so let's hear from justin and catherine now thank you so much catherine and speaking of catherine's i'm here with yet another catherine uh catherine schlegel thank you so much uh catherine for zooming with me for interacting with me digitally well well justin the pleasure is all mine um i want to get into all the important work you're doing to restore our forests um but before we dive in i understand that there's something something else we have in common i think we went to the same school attended the same college faster yeah um i i feel like i attended vassar college and graduated around the year 2000 but i don't know i i feel you were there as well maybe i i attended occasionally you graduated and it has yielded um i mean this is a ringing endorsement professor because what you do is uh is so incredible so important um can you tell us a little bit about what that work is what it entails and how you came to work with the nature conservancy yeah since i came back to my home state of colorado um one thing i've always grew up loving was the forest here and when i came back three years ago i went on this field trip to the middle of a burn scar and i looked around and it had burned 20 years ago when i still lived here and it was like the moon there were no trees and there's just like small grasses and it was one of the saddest places i visited and that's the story of a lot of our forests in colorado we're finding that wildfire is burning more frequently it's burning larger areas and it's burning hotter in a lot of those areas that higher severity so there are these great swaths of land that are completely devastated it doesn't appear as though they're going to grow back how do you then go in and try to regenerate a forest like that what is that what does that look like well there's two ideas right traditionally we've gone in with tree planters and baby trees and that is a great way to get trees growing but we're finding that they're limited um tree planters by how far they can get into those burned areas they just typically can't get too far from roads it it'd be too much work so we spend a lot of our time thinking about how we can get in further and sort of start to cover or take on some of that responsibility for reforesting those far away acres and so you're you personally are hang gliding into these areas these more remote areas and just sprinkling the seeds from the hang glider nailed it yeah um i you know we've received this advice focus on the problem not the solution the solutions um hang gliding the problem is um the seeds there are very few of them we don't have enough collected to even reforest all the burn scars if we could wow and the second is how do we best protect them once we put them out there there are deer mice there are birds there are chipmunks that love to eat those seeds and the idea was that we'd put the seeds inside little pellets and that the rodents would be less able to find them i've had many many iterations of that one weekend i decided to build a bicycle powered seed coating machine in my driveway but essentially we've we've landed on coating the seeds and the world's hottest chili pepper imagine yeah it's terrible on planting day a lot of chili pepper in the eyes who has to who's the taste tester who has to be the guinea pig there um yeah well none of us are taste testing it but we we wear gloves we have to wear rubber gloves so what is a typical day like for you i mean your work is so fascinating but and and obviously what you're doing is so hugely important but what does it mean practically to be you in a day going to your job well we are a science based organization and it is pretty darn fun to be a scientist so it means that for every great idea that we come up with we go and test it in the field to see how it performs and our goal is to sort of share that information with everyone right this is what works and this is what doesn't work so just last week we were in a big burn scar we were putting out 12 different types of seeds with 12 different ideas that we have and we will be going back every month to see which ones germinate so i really an average field day is like a lot of being on my hands and knees and crawling around looking for baby baby trees oh my gosh okay catherine when you say 12 different seeds are they forgive me i'm incredibly ignorant i didn't graduate um are they different types of tree are they different species of trees or or are they coated with different things to prevent uh animals yeah so we're focusing all our efforts on just one type of tree the ponderosa pine those trees that is most affected by climate as it gets warmer it lives at that edge between two ecosystems so we're seeing is really affected by fire and on the flip side we're also seeing that the hotter temperatures may get harder for it to grow back into an adult tree right those drought years are really hard on young trees and finally it has a pretty big seed that's not able to travel very far from the parent tree so you can think of all that pond that's like in your nose and a lot of seeds that fly through the air but this is like an apple scene [Music] and how can people contribute to what you're doing and contribute to the work that you are uh i i can't believe these contraptions that you're creating in your garage but it must cost money and so is it as simple as donating well justin i i love to say a lot of things but in your heart each person can change the world there's no one stopping you so i encourage everyone to do something local plant a tree with your local organization plant a flower in your front yard get involved donate if that's right for you but it will take all of us working together to solve these really tough entrenched problems so let's keep this conversation going i i that sounds good i thank you for having the conversation with me catherine and um thank you for the work you're doing it is so impressive so important and uh it's really fascinating to hear about so thank you thank you and and thanks vasser if you're curious about you know wanting to send your kids to a school look what it can produce someone's saving the world and a clown who's somewhat curious about what the work the savior is doing uh thank you so much and um thanks to the nature conservancy for setting this up happy earth day everyone i'm coyote peterson and as many of you know i have a pretty wild job that i would not be able to do without this incredible planet that we call home if you truly love the great outdoors then i'm asking you to join me and the nature conservancy in speaking up for nature in any way that you can now to celebrate i'm encouraging you to do something special for the planet today it can be as small as picking up a piece of trash or as big as donating to your favorite conservation cause remember every action counts and trust me the wild animals that we share this wonderful place with depend on us as humans to preserve what lies ahead be brave stay wild and happy earth day wow that was fantastic so our next speaker is kashan myers the executive director of habesha an amazing nonprofit that focuses on providing the metro atlanta georgia area with education and training in urban organic agriculture sustainable energy technology and green living because shawn received a bs in psychology from florida a m university and a master's of education from howard university kashan comes from a family of farmers teachers and he decided to come back to those roots when he founded habesha in 2002. kashan welcome i have to tell you before we get started that i was actually born and went to college in atlanta so i'm really excited to hear about the great work you're doing in my hometown very nice no thank you jennifer for having me thank you nature conservancy happy earth day um or as we say here in ghana happy assassin day um so i'm glad to be here thank you for letting me be a part of this beautiful occasion wonderful well i'm happy a saucy day and let's start off with you telling us a little bit more about your organization habesha yeah well um our organization is called habersham incorporated um it's an acronym that stands for helping africa by establishing schools at home and abroad and as you mentioned we were started in 2002 and really there are five major areas that we focus on um cultural education sustainable agriculture entrepreneurship holistic health and technology and when we begin we focus um on youth um particularly um as you mentioned you know i grew up in a place called woodbine georgia which is southeast georgia um right near the georgia fort florida border on the coast and it was there that i got my my foundation of who i am you know there's an african proverb that says um it takes a village to raise a child and i'm definitely raised by the village and so i understood the the benefit of respect honor and connecting with the land um but it wasn't until later in life that i really wanted to take it on as i guess a career um and so our organization was founded in 2002 and with the with the goal of really connecting young people particularly young people of african descent with who they are because we know that when you know people know more about who they are and where their centered at it helps them to move forward in life so we started the organization really to connect with young people and as we continue to grow grow and do things with young people around connecting them with their culture connecting them with the land we realize that it takes really that village again so we expanded our focus to not only youth but to the families of those young people and we begin in 2004 um building community gardens in the metro atlanta area some people may be familiar with the term gorilla gardening we were doing that kind of before it got popular um but we saw the benefit of particularly connecting young people with with nature connecting young people with good healthy food and connecting young people with each other and so by doing this over time it grew um for about six years we continued to work with young people doing after school programs doing community garden projects and in 2011 we started a program called hobby style works which was focused more on young adults with the specific interest of business development and entrepreneurship and so this was a training program around [Music] urbana now that's when um first lady michelle obama had the garden and from there we were able to um find more ways to connect with young people so um and then in 2017 as you mentioned we were connected with the nature conservancy um through miriam darma um who was at the time the cities director and we launched an initiative called urban green jobs which tied not only urban agriculture but all of the components of green infrastructure watershed management again focus on workforce development so we've been building the momentum we love to see what's happening around the world that the earth is getting taken care of more and we're glad to be a part of this movement to take care of the earth which in turn take care of ourselves that's fantastic kashan that you just put that story in such important terms in terms of the relationship between community self-empowerment and of course in the environment and so thank you so much for the partnership that you have with the nature conservancy so um in talking about your work i have heard you say there's no culture without agriculture i just love that could you tell us a little bit more about what that means to you yes so um when i was a graduate student um at howard university in washington dc um maybe like my first or second day on campus i was on campus and they had this uh like an outdoor concert and there was a gentleman who was singing by the name of rasd he was singing a song and i won't try to sing it like him but it went kind of like there's no culture without agriculture there's no culture without agriculture and it hit me so hard when i heard that term that afterwards i went up to him and said hey you know i love that song where can i get your music et cetera et cetera this was probably around 1998 and he told me it actually wasn't him who coined the term there was an elder in the washington dc community baba tariq oduno who actually mentioned the term and he was very much inspired by dr george washington carver i had a chance to meet baba oduno while i was at howard university learn from him um and get the spark and inspiration of connecting more people to growing food so this was even prior to starting hobby shop when we began our hobby shop works program in 2011 we use that as our model there's no culture without agriculture and it has both the literal and a figurative meaning so literally the word agriculture right has culture connected into it um also for us we see it particularly as people of african descent agriculture has always been a part of our culture it's always been we've always been connected to the land in one way or another so we found this as a way really to to feed two birds with one seed if you will and outline how there's a strong connection between agriculture um the land and our people and so since then we've been using it everyone loves it but again i always have to give you know special shout out to baba tariq oduno in washington dc he's the one who coined that term and now we've been able to spread it throughout the world that's fantastic well you've just spread it even wider today and thanks for for uh sharing that with us it's fantastic so um kashan i understand you're in ghana right now um what are you working on right now that excites you most and before you answer i just want to remind everyone in the audience to please put your questions in the chat so we can get you involved in the conversation yeah well you know in in two so we we were basing we've been based in atlanta we've had branches in new york washington dc we've done um cultural education and rights of passage programs um started in 2004 um through a program called black trial roots where we were taking youth of african descent from america teaching them about their history and culture and giving them an experiential learning opportunity in ghana um so since 2004 we've been taking young people um here in ghana and we built relationship with communities here over the years um one of the communities in particular uh a community called liatelte has always encouraged us to not only come to visit but to create opportunities to have permanent connections um they've been sharing and requesting for years we didn't have the capacity or necessarily the financial support to do it but in 2015 we embarked on an initiative to create an indigenous research and training institute that was focused on sustainability um we have named it after the world renowned ethnobotanist dr anthony kwaku-endo it's called the kwaku-ando sustainability institute and the idea behind this institute is that we'll focus on all things sustainable from an indigenous african perspective um for long unfortunately many of the practices of african people particularly on the continent have been seen as less than primitive or you know backwards but what we found is that actually many of these practices that the people have used over the years have actually been now are at the forefront of what we consider is the environmental movement um whether that's water conservation whether that's you utilizing the land around you whether that's regenerative planting whether that's connecting with the land through our various herbs and healing so we're building this research institute that's focused on um natural and sustainable building medicinal herbs organic and sustainable agriculture and of course the arts and culture as they connect so i've actually been traveling here since 2006 back and forth usually six months on six months off um really supervising the development of the initiative um i'm so excited about it um we were initially slated to open in october of 2020 but of course covet hit so we're still um planning on opening more than likely march 2022 but it's been a labor of love to be here to reconnect in a lot of ways um for me as someone of african descent who is his trace my lineage um to my family back to ghana and also to now reconnect other people of african descent to africa and in turn help to to heal the world and help to do better by mama earth or what as we call assassination that is fantastic um so i could talk to you for another hour but i know that we have to to move on here but i'd love just to hear from you kashan before we open it up to questions from the audience is there something specific that you want to share about earth day or why you wanted to participate today well you know to me there's a slogan says earth day is every day which is true um but definitely today is the day that there's a focus on the earth and we want to be a part of that mission um just to give a quick story i um in 2019 we also take um students to ethiopia as well we were um we got into ethiopia in july i think it was july 28th and literally the day we got in from the airport we saw people around like planting and doing things you know just in addis ababa in the capital city and we were like wow this is a nice community effort you know we thought it was just a community effort um it wasn't until later that evening that we realized that ethiopia had planted 350 million trees in 12 hours um and i was so inspired by that um because i know i believe india had done like 66 million so there have been these momentum around planting trees and so if nothing else i encourage everyone to plant um whether that's a tree whether it's a seed in the ground there's another african proverb that says the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago and the second best time is now so plant that tree both um literally and figuratively that's what we try to do plant seeds plant seedlings plant trees in the mines particularly of young people because we see that as a part of their healing not only individually but healing for the earth so i would encourage everyone to plant a tree today plant a tree tomorrow plant a tree every day absolutely could not agree with you more that was was really really beautiful and um i think you're you're seeing these inspirational um efforts to plant trees and i think at tnc we also think not just about planting trees but really trees but also bringing life back to land and what you're doing with your organization is just exactly that bringing life back to land bringing power back to community to individuals for people to really engage with their history and their culture it's just amazing what you're doing and i really hope to come visit you one day in ghana um or in atlanta certainly and learn more about how we can increase and strengthen our partnership together so um we are getting not really any questions yet but we are certainly hearing from a lot of you with uh a comment for the phrase maybe it's instead of to change using the phrase kill bird kill two birds with one stone feed two birds with one seed and that's just a beautiful beautiful phrase as well so um thank you so much for for being with us for sharing your story really appreciate your time and um good luck with all your incredible work in ghana and atlanta and everywhere you're working so thanks kashan for being with us so catherine i'm going to turn it back over to you for our next guest thank you so much jen and kashan i loved hearing what you had to say and i particularly love that quote that you sang i'm not going to sing it there's no culture without agriculture when i think about what ties so many people and families and cultures together it's often our food and our family recipes and i think that's a perfect segue into our next speaker the nature conservancy senior scientist for agriculture and food systems mike weironen is going to be doing something a little bit different he's going to be giving us a cooking demonstration and it's a long time family recipe too at the same time he's going to be talking about what we can do at home to diversify our food choices especially eating more plants is a great thing that every single one of us can do it's good for us and it's good for the planet and he's going to explain more about why that's so important for our environment take us away mike thank you catherine so my job at the nature conservancy is to work with our programs and farmers around the world to promote the adoption of regenerative agriculture and to help transition to a regenerative food system regenerative agriculture is really about promoting practices both on a field and in a landscape that help reduce climate change by sequestering carbon or avoiding greenhouse gas emissions help protect water quality and preserve water resources as well as encourage and restore habitat to promote biodiversity the thing about regenerative agriculture though is it's not something that you need a satellite and a combine and sophisticated technology to practice those things can help but it's also the kind of thing that you can do at home some regenerative agriculture practices are in fact as old as agriculture things like crop rotation so for example right here in this garden i've got some garlic here that i planted in the fall this garlic will be harvested in a few months and when i take that out it'll be replaced by tomatoes that's the principle of crop rotation that can help cut disease and pest cycles it can help add diversity both for biodiversity and for your your food production itself another example of a regenerative agriculture practice is cover cropping this is when after the crop is harvested you plant another crop not necessarily with the intent of harvesting it and consuming it but really as a means of protecting the soil and taking more carbon out of the atmosphere and putting it into the soil both the garlic as well as this broccoli here both of these are planted in the fall and while i will harvest them they also serve that cover crop function what i'd like to do now is i'd like to share with you a dish that i think kind of helps encapsulate all of those ideas and actually include some products from my own garden so i'm going to cook a dish for you today called kuser which is a grain-based salad that's quite common in turkey i learned it from my mother-in-law who lives in turkey and it really makes me think of that statement by kashan earlier that there's no culture without agriculture and i think that's quite important because food really is a great pathway to understanding not only the diverse cultures of the world but also the diverse ecosystem so i'm going to cook this dish which highlights based on bulgur which is actually a parboiled whole wheat berry that's cracked bulgur is important because it's not only is it a whole grain so that means it brings fiber and it brings a lot of nutrients that you wouldn't get in a processed grain but it also is a really great base for all of these herbs and vegetables i'm going to add so this is parsley i harvested from my garden i've actually got some parsley here that i planted in a seed and transplanted into this takeaway container just a few days ago this is something that could actually grow on my windowsill it could grow my fire escape my balcony it could grow really anywhere in the house so this type of producing your own herbs producing your own food is something really everyone can do and it's a great way to kind of connect with nature and to make your diet more healthy so this dish features a lot of fresh ingredients and then it comes together with some really interesting sauces and some herbs and spices what's really exciting is actually in my garden right now here in washington dc i've got pretty much all these plants growing most of them aren't ready yet because it's still the spring but these are the kind of things that almost anyone can grow at home these green onions i'm going to teach you a little bit of a trick here which is actually i'm going to put these here in water and if i wait in probably two weeks i'll be able to harvest these green onions again okay so i'm gonna start preparing this dish now so diversifying your diet and kind of exploring the diets and cuisines of other places is a fantastic way to actually help the food system i mean imagine quinoa for example quinoa was really something most people in the us hadn't heard of just 10 years ago pretty much everyone knows what it is now and that's kind of created a market for a really important traditional staple grain in the andes so by diversifying your diet you can not only improve your health you can discover new tastes and new sensations like that but you can also help create markets for crops that can be really agronomically and culturally important in different parts of the world i'm going to add some olive oil this here is a mix of tomato paste and pepper paste chili peppers to give it a bit of heat and this is sumac it's got this sort of like i call it like a lemony tangy flavor mixed with a bit of barbecue and the last thing to add to this is what they call nar ekshi which is basically a pomegranate molasses [Music] so transitioning to a regenerative food system requires thinking about more than just agriculture it also requires thinking about the food that we eat one of the most important things that everyone can do is becoming a more informed food consumer trying to understand where your food is coming from greetings bill nye here you know science is very important to me science is how we understand the world around us it's how we know nature science enables us to innovate so we can address big problems like global climate change and that's why i have and i will continue to speak up on behalf of nature and i'm excited to join the nature conservancy and you as we celebrate the science the people and the stories that are changing this world for the better fantastic so everyone we're about halfway through our program so we're going to take a break from the interviews for just a moment and hear a beautiful earth day message and performance by singer songwriter and activist aloe blacc hey everyone aloe blacc here i'm thrilled to be with you in celebration of earth day and these amazing nature change makers and their stories as a musician a songwriter and activist i believe in the power of the individual voice one ballad can send chills down your spine and one speech can ignite a global movement that's why i'm so excited to perform my new single for you called other side which is a song about the perseverance of love and understanding in the face of what may feel like an uphill battle and breaking through those issues together to find ourselves in a stronger more rewarding place i hope it might serve as some inspiration for us to continue sharing our stories finding our common ground and speaking up for nature in our own ways to create the future we all deserve so please enjoy and thank you for [Music] listening we've been to walls we couldn't climb and we chased the light that made us blind but i know we can walk this road one step at a time no matter how far no matter how wide your hand i'll hold and you hold mine no matter how long no [Music] saving you is gonna save my life and if you're ready i'll hold you [Music] [Applause] yeah we can make it to the other side we lost our breath in smoke and fight [Music] as we tried to balance on this white but i know we can find our way if we take time no matter how long no matter how tight and together we'll weather the storm it'll because if you're calling [Music] then even if i'm falling saving you is gonna save my life and if you're ready i'll hold you steady when the load is heavy [Music] we can make it to the other side [Music] we can make it to the other side [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] saving you is gonna save my life [Music] we can make it to the other side [Music] yeah we can make it to the other side and we can make it to the other side [Music] that was incredible what an amazing tribute by aloe blacc um i have to say it does make me missing live music um and knowing that we can all get to the other side of the pandemic of all the struggles that many people around the world are facing right now we can get to the other side so thank you so much ella black for that incredible incredible song so our next speaker is a pioneer on so many levels so dr nalini nadkarni is known as the queen of the forest canopy for both her global research on forest canopies and also for her work to bring science to the mainstream or as she says taking it beyond natural history museums and classrooms just last year she advised national geographic and toy company mattel in creating a barbie in her likeness along with the entire explorer series dr nad carney is also a board member with the nature conservancy's utah chapter she's calling in right now from salt lake city and we're so delighted to have her here with us today nalini welcome thanks so much great to have you thanks so as i mentioned in your intro many folks watching today might not know might know you best from your recent press around the explorer series bart can you tell us a little bit about how you thought like let's create a barbie about what i do it's so so cool tell us more sure well you know as with so many conservationists i really want to encourage young girls to consider protection of nature as part of their lives maybe someday to be uh you know work in conservation like you are jen or simply to be aware of the need for conservation actions and as a little girl i love climbing trees um but what about little girls who grow up in tokyo or new york city who never really encounter trees to climb how would they gain that sense of wanting to safeguard trees and other ambassadors to nature um and so i really needed to link trees to something that these little girls already care about and um i learned that most girls including my own daughter when she was six years old really do care about barbie um and so in 2004 i created what i call the treetop barbie a barbie who's dressed and accessorized like a field scientist with an accompanying um pamphlet about canopy plants and i called mattel to um sort of offer the idea to them but for some reason at that time they just weren't interested and so my students and i started making treetop barbies ourselves we bought them at used consignment stores and goodwill stores we got volunteers to volunteer to make little outfits for them we bought little helmets on ebay um and we created this informative um pamphlet and uh then fast forward 15 years later to 2020 i got a call from mattel in national geographic and they were starting this line of ex what they called explorer barbies a polar biologist a nature photographer and other nature professionals and they asked me to be their advisor on this line of explorer barbies and in turn for that advice uh they made me this one-of-a-kind nalini look-alike treetop barbie um so i'll show it to you right now because i think it's one of my great possessions so here she is with her little helmet and her little booklet and her little ropes and binoculars um and you know it's really funny i think um you know i when i think about what it means it's not really about me or my idea or even mattel i think what it's about is that it's signaling a shift in society in the last 15 years you know the marketing research of this second largest toy corporation in the world revealed that little girls want more in their role models than just going to a prom or trying to catch ken as a boyfriend and so it has really led me to think about the diverse ways of messaging about environmental challenges that we face and jen i know you have a lot of experience with business development and with women's banking projects so you could probably guide me on the work that i've initiated now to work with businesses to forge thoughtful collaborations between conservationists and corporations that precludes conservationists being greenwashed but opens a portal to turn corporate products into vectors of conservation messages yeah absolutely no that's critical and i think you're just completely flipping the switch on what barbie has meant to so many people and i just love that you're changing the narrative and really being able to demonstrate that um girls can grow up and be whatever they want to be yes including a pre-canopy researcher so um so given that tell us a little bit about i mean did you start when you were a little girl did you want to be always a tree canopy researcher do you have other dreams well you know i always loved trees i was always climbing trees when i was a kid it was it was kind of my place of refuge in a kind of chaotic family and when i was eight years old i remember very clearly making an oath that when i got to be a grown-up i would protect trees because they protected me and so in college i learned about the field of ecology and i learned that ecologists can actually make a living studying nature which was amazing and that kind of turned me towards my career in conservation but you know i also credit my parents for their appreciation for many different ways of knowing in the world my dad came from india he was a hindu he was a scientist my mom was from brooklyn new york she was a russian parented she was an orthodox jew who studied languages and so they raised us five kids you know to find commonality across what seemed like real differences like our favorite dinner was curry bagels you know that was really yummy but i think that this mixed up background has actually really helped me to gain access to diverse audiences um diverse public groups for example i've been carrying out a lot of conservation work with faith-based groups you might ask well why faith-based groups because really because there's so many of them they're actually 80 of the people on earth self-identify as being religious or believing in god you know that's a lot more i'm sorry to say than conservation and environmentalists so i decided that my approach would be to instead of drawing on scientific authorities my approach was to draw upon their religious authorities to raise awareness about the importance of trees so what i did was i downloaded the holy scriptures of all the world religions the bible the quran the talmud and the writings that these groups already believe in just like little girls already are convinced of the attractiveness of barbie um i search for all the verses in those scriptures that that use the word tree or forest and i was able to demonstrate with these data so to speak um that trees are used as spiritual symbols they're described as having practical use through location markers they're analogies to god and so i put together a sermon based on these scriptures and i then started um presenting them to instead of in a university or a museum setting i started knocking on church doors and i i collaborated with clergy to deliver the sermon on trees and spirituality to pulp from the pulpits of over 40 places of worship of very diverse denominations i've also with my students map trees and church yards and written pamphlets about the trees that grow on the sacred ground of church yards because if the church yards are sacred when the soil is sacred and trees that grow in the soil must be sacred too and therefore they are worthy of our protection we've also organized combination tree plantings between university people and church groups and you know it's really amazing jen in all of this i've never had a conflict between science and religion or evolution and creationism and i think that's because what i was doing kind of embodies what philosophers called called intellectual humility intellectual humility that is i was putting aside my own authorities and used theirs i didn't have to become a member of that faith but i could interact with all of them in ways that showed that we are all humans who all care about our earth well that is absolutely fantastic and um i think it's an interesting corollary to what we just heard from kashan that connection with people to culture and history and you've been able to do it through spirituality and religion and being able to share that that universal message of the importance of preserving and protecting mother earth is just exactly why we're here on earth day so thank you yes sure i'm sure some of our our folks today would love to hear a little bit more about your scientific research and by the way if you're listening you can put your questions for um nalini in the chat please do that we're gonna have time for questions at the end but tell us a little bit more um you know inspire the inner biologist or forest canopy researcher tell us a little bit more about your scientific research sure well i'd love to take you on my next field trip to costa rica to sort of experience the three-dimensional world of the forest canopy but you know my work is not just about the drive the joy of tree climbing it also concerns ecosystem ecology trying to understand the ecological roles that different parts of the forest in my case the canopy dwelling plants what roles they play in the large-scale processes of nutrient cycling in forests and you know i see the forest canopy as and the first as a whole really as a tapestry of species and of interactions that create something like a real tapestry something that's connected uh complex useful strong and and really beautiful and when i started this work 35 years ago on the canopy was really an unknown place it was called the last biotic frontier so early on most of my research was descriptive just sort of trying to describe the biomass of these canopy organisms but later i tried to quantify the ecological roles of these plants how they capture nutrients from rain and mist hold that in their biomass and then return that and recycle those nutrients to the forest floor we've also learned that these canopy plants are very fragile even though they look so they look so lush and productive they take years in fact decades to regrow after they've been disturbed and in more recent years my colleagues and i have seen longer intervals that is the effects of climate change in these tropical cloud forests longer intervals without the nourishing mist and rain and fog that these canopy plants depend on so now i'm working with plant physiologists to understand um their adaptations to drought we're also working with farmers and with land managers to try to understand the dynamics of what happens when you clear a forest and and get isolated trees in those pastures to find out whether or not those relic trees as we call them can sustain the biodiversity and ecosystem function that their brothers and sisters in the primary forest carry out and all of these really have brought me to understanding more about social science not just the natural sciences and that i think goes back to the idea of tapestry of the interweaving of understanding of the values of trees from many perspectives of their ecological values their social values their aesthetic values their economic values all woven together that is amazing so um i have a question for you do you have a favorite place a favorite forest um or forest type where you find peace and joy you know that's a great question but i have to say jen that i find every forest and really every individual tree a place where i can find refuge where i can find peace where i feel less stressed out less anxious because i start thinking and feeling in the time that trees have the multiple generations the human generations that trees encompass so when i enter any forest whether it's a little pocket park here in salt lake city or whether it's a fantastic primary tropical cloud forest like monteverde that's the place that i want to be and i want to share with as many people as possible that's beautiful um i couldn't agree with you more i figured that might be your answer but i just wanted to find out so um tell us a little bit about i mean you know this is a challenging time for for so many people and um i know those of us that are in the environmental field feel hopeful about what's happening right now today as we speak with the biden administration coming out with some very important um new policy objectives and goals and the world is coming as well we're actually um you know trying to to listen and and achieve more than we have in the past but what gives you hope you hopeful during these days of coven that's a great question jen you know i think all of us are continually walking on what i think of what i picture in my mind as this knife edge between despair and hope i think if we feel too much despair we get immobilized if we hear too many hopeful stories you say oh everybody nature conservancy is taking care of it i don't have to do anything but i would love to share a hopeful message with all of you that came out of one of my other public engagement programs that involves bringing science and concert conservation projects to the incarcerated to incarcerated adults and children in youth youth detention centers we bring science lectures and hands-on conservation projects and so this hopeful little piece that i'd like to share with you comes um from one of the one of the students in the in a youth in custody detention center here in utah we had introduced the idea of and some information about climate change and we invited the students to write their responses in the form of haikus and i'd like to share two of them the first is an articulation of the challenges that we face gigantic ice blocks here since before time started we make them fragile and here is the response of hope collective action is what we need for saving our beautiful home and i think that knowing that these were written by youth who come from homes that are broken in lives that seem at this point to be irreparably damaged makes these messages so very important but i think there are other hopeful signals that the mattel corporation is making is marketing barbies um that are trying to inspire young girls to to careers in nature and conservation uh religious and non-religious people are working to plant trees side by side the incarcerated and men and women who are involved with our conservation projects do that work with joy and activity and action and a sense of contribution and conservationists are taking time to interact with some of the most underserved groups in our country so i believe that tnc and other academic institutions and entities from all sectors of society can create this tapestry of nature and humans that is like a real tapestry something that's complex and connected that's useful that's strong and above all beautiful thanks jen thank you so much nalini so we're going to turn to um some questions now from the audience um so this question i'm going to ask you comes from mercedes car camo and she asks with the development of the barbie what is the reaction of young girls that have not seen or been to a forest environment well you know i don't have data on that i don't i'm not privy to the corporate you know sort of information about the reception of treetop barbie but i do know that they're selling well um i do know that young girls who play with toys that provide positive role models and this is based on informal science education research there is a reinforcement of those role models up to young women so i can only assume that having someone like treetop barbie um in the playground or in the in the playroom of some of these young women these young girls um will will shift them in that direction not just to urge them to have a career but but to take in conservation and protection of nature as something that they do on an everyday basis we all don't all have to be conservationists in terms of profession but i think all of us can be and should be conservation in terms of our attitudes and actions and hopefully treetop barbie and the explorer barbies will help encourage that absolutely so nalini we're getting lots of people asking if they can get an access to the recording of your sermon um is that can you share with us how people can get access to that well it might take a little looking at this point but i'll try to put that in the chat box after i speak here um this was recorded at the um you know the unitarian first unitarian church here in salt lake city and it really was about um it was all about how trees are connected completely um spiritually and religiously um to all kinds of religions around the world um i also have a couple of publications that i published in theological journals as well as conservation journals and i'd be happy to share those as well fantastic thank you so much nalini we really appreciate you being with us thanks for all you do as a champion for trees for nature for communicating about it to new audiences and for really reminding us what nature brings to us every day on earth day but of course every day so catherine i'm going to turn it back over to you to introduce our next guests that was so fantastic so um fellaini's work is featured by the american association for the advancement of science they have a dialogue on science ethics and religion and if you're listening on youtube i put a link in the chat just go back a little bit where you can learn more about her work with religious communities i love it so much because i do that myself in fact one of the very last events i did before coveted shut us down was delivering a sermon at one of the biggest churches in my hometown of toronto the meeting house on why as christians if we take the bible seriously we will be out at the front of the line demanding climate action instead of dragging our feet at the back connecting with people over shared values whether it's food as we learned before whether it's caring about others whether it's supporting women and children whether it's the fact that we're a parent the fact that we live in salt lake city like she does or texas like i do or arlington like jen does or the fact that we're a person of faith when we connect over shared values we're able to show people that who they already are is the perfect person to care speaking of reaching out to people based on shared values i want to introduce our next speakers sixteen-year-old climate activist cosi effigy and the nature conservancy's very own nature vest program associate victoria wu victoria and kosi are going to be talking about her work in maine as a change maker fellow with the maine environmental education association plus how she manages to do all this with being a student and an athlete at the same time because you're an inspiration to all of us take it away victoria so i'm here today with cosi fiji who is not just any ordinary high schooler but also an intersectional climate justice activist and environmental steward hi cozy hi hi i'm so happy to have you here with us um i'm really excited to really get into what you're all about you've been so busy um so we know that today we're honoring not just our amazing planet but also all the change makers just like you that are doing great things for nature um so i'm curious how your passion for the environment began yeah um i guess my passion for the environment kind of began um when i was around i guess around seven years old um originally i i was born in maryland right out of dece right outside of dc actually and i moved to maine when i was about seven and it was kind of a huge culture shock for many reasons but one of the first things that i really noticed about maine was just the access to nature and you know um in dc a large metropolitan area i didn't have that and so i guess that's really where my passion kind of that's so cool so you hold quite a few roles you're a fellow with the main environmental change makers you co-chair the nature-based and educational consortium climate action task force you serve on the steering committee for that and you collaborate with main climate table antigen cohort that's a mouthful can you tell me a little bit about what you do with each one of those roles and why they're so important to you yeah for sure so um i guess starting uh with my fellow position um i am in a kind of um assistance role in a lot of the project that a lot of the projects that the organization does and with my co-chair position with the climate education task force we do a lot of policy work and policy advocacy work for climate education in the state of maine and as a steering committee member on the same organization um i just do a lot of you know advisory and overseeing just the different the other different task force in on the consortium and yeah anything else there like that's not enough i mean oh yeah the intergen project so with the energen project it's um really just an intergenerational um initiative just you know learning about different perspectives of youth and um older individuals around the issue of climate and um it's a very interesting and uh very thought-provoking experience for sure cool so let's dig in a little bit can you tell me about something specific that you've accomplished recently yeah so um specifically towards the um specifically towards the nature-based education consortium's climate education task force with that group um in the state of maine there is this committee called the maine climate council which um overseas and tries to create policy for surrounding the climate and um in in developing these policies and recommendations to the legislature there was a big gap when it came to climate education and so um with my group we kind of saw that gap and advocated for having climate education talk to individuals on the council and um because of that um because of that advocacy um you know uh climate education is now included in those recommendations to the main climate council so that's a win congratulations thank you oh man all right well hopefully you're making time to celebrate these wins and making time for fun in general um but i i understand you're 16 you still got you got gotta go to class you got your homework can you tell me a little bit about how you balance all of these things and maybe what you do for fun oh balance more like a juggling act um you know definitely just making time you know just small pockets of time just for myself to do things that i enjoy some things that i do for fun i really love to bake um i just love watching netflix shows as well just you know just pretty much just enjoying the small moments of peace that i have absolutely uh so what are you watching right now right now i actually just finished the anime show attack on titan and for anyone that has not watched it you definitely should because it's amazing i've heard good things i've heard good things um and also don't shoot the messenger but i think i heard a rumor that you were a harry potter fan yes i am i'm actually a really big harry potter fan um yeah it's yeah it's kind of a big part of my personality well we're gonna have to know what house are you i'm a slytherin actually and i'm actually very proud of that i know it's kind of seen as the evil mischievous house but something that i'm proud of there's nothing wrong with being a slytherin ambition that's all yeah well you can count me as your friendly support hufflepuff all right well i'm glad that you're making time for fun things i'm glad that you're you're balancing everything but um we're getting up to the end of our conversation the end of our time together so if you'll indulge me i have one more question i'd love to hear about what you hope for the future when it comes to nature yeah i guess what i hope for the future when it comes to nature is definitely not even just an access to nature for everyone but more specifically an access to nature for children of color because especially when i was growing up in maryland right outside of dc i didn't have any access to nature and so i was privileged enough to move to maine to actually experience it for some part of my youth but there are a lot of children that don't have that especially when especially when it comes to children of color so that's definitely something that i hope for the future oh i love that near and dear to my heart too well thank you so much for taking time to hang out with us today and thank you everybody for joining us all right we're going to sign off now happy earth day everybody hi everyone i'm martha stewart and i'm delighted to be here with all of you in celebration of earth day i live in nature i am surrounded by 150 acres of beautiful farmland woodland animals of birds of all sorts and lots and lots of beautiful greenery i wake up every single day thinking about nature thinking what else i can do to beautify my surroundings and and plant for the future it's all about the future for me and it's about nurturing what grows so please join me and tnc and speaking up for nature today and every day so that we may all continue to find our own inspiration in nature for years to come and remember today is really for tomorrow everything you do today counts for tomorrow plan for the future think about the future think about your kids and their kids and uh make sure that you protect as much of nature as you can welcome back many of you will recognize our next guest aaliyah jasmine she is a tv host and environmental journalist her award-winning stories have aired on nbc news mtv and the discovery channel she recently launched an environmentally focused media company called lily media and design lab aaliyah jasmine is proudly canadian and she served on the board of the nature conservancy's canadian affiliate nature united she is joining us from her home today in santa monica california which is the traditional land of the tongva nation aaliyah jasmine welcome and thank you so much for being here today oh my gosh thank you so much for having me this has been such an exciting show i have to say the treetopper barbie was a real highlight for me as well as seeing obviously fellow canadian at catherine hey ho you know the announcement of her joining this team and i'm such a fan girl so being in the green room with her backstage has been really exciting that is amazing and we're having a lot of fun in the green room and and i'm glad to see so many canadians coming together today who share a passion for for nature um so so um elia tell us as an environmental journalist you have covered just incredible stories around the world so what have been some of the recent standout stories for you at nbc news in los angeles yeah you know i think since reporting here in los angeles it's really been the california wildfires the last five years um the devastation of the fires the aftermath of the fires particularly the effect that they have on wildlife um you know we i covered extensively we have a population of mountain lions here that are on the verge of extinction and how they had to deal with the wildfires and you know being stuck in these areas that are cut off by highways highways la is known for and how it stops them from being able to escape these devastating fires and actually cut down their lifespan and cut down their chances of of continuing to uh populate and to grow and to flourish so um that's been uh a really incredible story that i've done long term is building this the world's biggest wildlife crossing here in los angeles to try and help not only the other the mountain lions but also much of the other species um that live here um and also nature beijing you know in the aftermath of these fires like goats who are brush especially down you know the hill the palisades or malibu um some really incredible stories uh some sad and some quite uplifting um and particularly i think a lot of the stories that i've i've really enjoyed around the environmental coverage here in l.a it's also the ones that bring in a social justice element you know things like tree canopy cover which i think in in the world of science and environmental circles is very well known but to the masses it is probably not as well known that something can cover really can impact um different socioeconomic pockets in different ways the idea of having shade or how it affects asthma rates i mean the difference between beverly hills and compton with tree and to be covered these type of um stories are are really interesting to me and it also i think what it really did for me is inspire me to launch you mentioned my environmentally focused production company that is pandemic it's called lily media design and the idea behind it was to really focus on stories that decolonize the history of our natural landscapes and bring these stories of environmental justice to a mainstream audience that maybe you don't know it or that need it simplified so they can understand it my co-founder is an architect an urban designer a landscape historian from harvard university and so this is a really huge important focus of me to really bring uh these stories have to do with both environmentalism but also social justice together and then simplify them in a broad way for a mainstream audience fantastic that is that's amazing and i think that's such a critical topic that we're we're dealing with now and talking about now and how the nature conservancy is really trying to do what we can to lean into that aspect of our work um i'd love to hear a little bit more about that and maybe we could we could share you could share with us a story that you worked on with nature conservancy actually in the great bear rainforest tell us a little bit about about that um experience and and how you came to report on that story so the great bear rainforest i've done many stories there um and a documentary there i've gone back a few times it is i mean when you talk about a spiritual experience being in the great barrier reinforced for me was the most spiritual experience i've ever had personally and and professionally um it was uh an experience like no other and it's like that every time i go back the greater rainforest for those who may not know it is home to many first nations who have stewarded their coastal rainforest for thousands of years um it's part of the largest coastal temperate rainforest on earth spans something like 100 million acres um but it's also home to whales wolves grizzly bears and the world's only spirit bear which is a subspecies of black bear with pure white fur but it's also rich in salmon streams and when i went up there i did not think that salmon was a story right i was like my first time going up there i think was in 2005 or something and i'm like what why do we care about the fish like we you know and it's actually was an unbelievable experience so i'll tell you very quickly our guide was from a local indigenous community whose ancestors had stewarded that land for generations and generations and he brought us through i was lucky enough to be the first salmon run and so he brought us through this dense rainforest and he actually like macheted parts of it through because there was access but it was where the bears walk so it was kind of like from the waist down and everything from the waist up could not could not go through so we made the holes a little bit bigger so we could continue walking in the bears footsteps and um what we saw was incredible so used to sod you know dead salmon everywhere and if you look at the end of it and the salmon are huge and if you look at these individual salmon what you would see was that um they were missing the part of their bodies where the eggs were and that's because that's what the bears ate and then they were missing their brains and that's because that's what the wolves and the rest of them all picked apart all the meat from the eagles and the actual skin and flesh and oil from these salmon were you know absorbed back into into the ground and into the grass that's what made that vegetation so green and flourishing and actually fed the trees that provide us oxygen so in other words like you could link our ability to breed to the salmon right and that's just among some of the incredible i mean these salmon are born in fresh water their bodies change and go into you know ocean spot water and then they come back and they actually find the exact stream that they were born in to lay their eggs i mean the salmon is like incredible and so i loved being in the rape urban forest i could talk about it for and i'm sorry if you've had like actual salmon people on i don't know if you've had salmon experts on before me i don't mean to steal anyone's bender but i am like obsessed with with the the nature and the salmon in this area and so i was um i think one of the things that struck me about going out there and doing that story was this idea that it's not just about saving the trees or saving the spirit bears but really the this ecosystem right the fact that everything depends on each other you take away that salmon and the whole thing falls apart you know that that that the need for that ecosystem that many of us won't even realize is there um and so when i started realizing that and that need to protect it i was so excited years later um to find out about the nature conservancy collaboration uh with local partners in coastal bc uh which resulted in the great uh great bear rainforest agreement which i believe was signed in 2016 about about 10 years after i had first gone there um but if for those watching who don't know about this it was i mean this was a huge huge deal in canada it was signed between 26 first nations and the british colombian government um and what it does is it permanently conserved 19 million acres of pacific coast between vancouver island and southeast alaska and so that was really exciting to me um and more than that was the idea that nature united the nature conservancy's canadian chapter was really going to prioritize indigenous rights and authority of all of their work in this area i was there firsthand i saw i saw how this this area operates and what it needs to survive and we cannot do that work without the people who have been stewarding that land for thousands of years so the fact that nature united was was such a big had such a big mo to um to honor the indigenous rights and authority at the heart of the conservation there uh was something i was i was very excited about and so when when i was asked to join the board of directors i i jumped at it well we are so happy to have you on the board of nature united and clearly um i have to say aaliyah i've never heard anyone speak so passionately about salmon who wasn't already a salmon fisherman before so that was just terrific you clearly were um saw the value of that species not only to the local environment but to the people there and um it clearly had a major impact on you so if you've been jennifer have you been no and i'm dying to go i'm okay i have been hearing about the great bear rainforest and the spirit bear for 25 years and i've never had a chance to go so once covet is over yes definitely coming to visit come visit i please have me bring you around i will like show i will help you guys as excited as i am about the salmon um but it is it really is that a lot if you need any travel tips let me know but oh i can't wait for you to come up to canada and visit absolutely i think um catherine is just saying that she would like to join us so we've got a girls trip in the making so it sounds fantastic oh my god my dream girl's trip i just like literally got super sweaty this is very exciting for me well we have we have to go fishing i love to fly fishing so i'll have to definitely do that too so um so aaliyah this is just amazing and thanks for sharing those stories i'd love to hear a little bit about um you know tell us a little bit about what inspires you most on this earth day you know the you've talked so deeply about great bear and um the work that the nature conservancy is doing with your help in um in canada but tell us something else what what inspires you most desert day you know i think what inspires me most this earth day is the is speak up for nature i truly believe that dialogue changes the world it's what i've i've led my entire career by i've seen it firsthand you know i was i was in south sudan after a civil war and i saw how little communities of teenage girls were using the power of their voices to try and educate their communities about different issues and i i truly believe that we've seen that in the last year during this pandemic with you know social justice uprisings and being able to see what the power of our voices can do and when you think back about when earth day was founded 51 years ago and you think about in 1990 when the entire globe on earth day spoke up at the same time this was before social media existed think about like now that we have the power of social media the idea to really use our voices for important things and and to also remember to bring in this really important aspect of environmental racism which i think you know as the environmental community it's important for us to acknowledge that at the beginning of this movement you know the green move was predominantly a white movement and so it's really important to be able to bring in um the inclusion of groups that were left out uh black and brown communities that were left out who are often the most impacted so for me it's using our voices to say that and i'd also like to add that i really think that another really important thing about this earth day is the idea of of nature-based solutions you know i think that's really important and i think it's it should really be noted that the nature conservancy and you know nature united in canada are really leading the way on that and i i don't you know i don't have to tell you about this um but i i i feel like maybe it's not spoken about enough so i'll just if you don't mind me taking one minute i am very passionate about this and i think that you know um for people who don't know natural climate solutions are strategies that actually use the power of nature to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and they do that in three ways one protecting managing and restoring right so protecting natural spaces that store greenhouse gases managing land better to reduce those emissions and then restoring nature's ability to sequester and store greenhouse gases and you can really make communities healthier and safer uh contributing to you know clean water air food production but also protecting against stuff that i cover protecting against uh wildfires droughts floodings these things that i cover in my journalistic career and something i think a lot of people take for granted is these nature-based solutions also provide recreational spaces for the average person to use and and you know you you achieve these things by working with indigenous communities and working with black and brown communities and so um and working with with what nature gave us right it's going back to the elements um the idea of things like sponge cities and so i personally think that if we can hold those kind of incredible scientific scientific studies that give us these great solutions uh as we move forward i think that um and use our voices to propel that i think we're in for a bright a bright future well elia um that was just incredible and i have to say that um you know having been in the nation conservancy now for for just under a year um you just put nature-based solutions so succinctly and beautifully that if you ever want a job call me hey listen i'm gonna be i'm gonna be on a megaphone i you know as you know like uh nature united has teamed up with an incredible amount of scientists i'm sure catherine hayjo knows many of these canadian scientists that are on board and they're releasing a study right we're releasing a study through nature united in the next little while um that's gonna actually give the canadian government like real ideas on how to implement uh you know ways to implement these ideas into real legislation and i hope the canadian government listened but i am definitely going to be using my voice loudly uh so so people know because everybody should know yes indeed thank you so much ali i really appreciate you being with us that was fantastic um and we unfortunately have to move on um we're going to turn it back to fellow canadian catherine catherine back to you for our next guest thank you aaliyah thank you i loved hearing about your experiences of course in british columbia and how nature can be such a meaningful and important part of our lives i think we can all relate to those moments when we've been incredibly moved or inspired by being somewhere in nature just like aaliyah was with the great bear rainforest so i'm curious if you're watching this live what in nature inspires you the most put it in the comments so for me i love two things i love forests and i love water and i grew up sailing in the great lakes and also sailing around the virgin islands i absolutely love to sail it's one of my favorite places to be and one of my favorite things to do and that relates directly to our next speaker so we now have tv personality danny washington and the nature conservancy's u.s virgin islands coral manager dr ashley lillis danny as you may know is an ocean advocate and she is the first african-american woman to host her own science television series called exploration nature knows best ashley is leading the development of our choral innovation hub where they're doing cutting edge work in helping corals reproduce even as waters get warmer and more acidic due to climate change that is so cool it has been such a pleasure to be with you here today and i cannot wait to connect more as i step into the role of chief scientist for the nature conservancy we have a lot of work to do but i know that we can do it if we all work together so happy earth day everyone and danny over to you i'm joined today by dr ashley lewis a marine ecologist and coral manager with the nature conservancy in the caribbean as an ocean advocate i've been looking forward to this conversation with you dr lewis welcome thanks danny i have very much been looking forward to talking to you as well it's so exciting to share with you what we're doing down here in the caribbean especially since you're such an amazing science communicator and ocean advocate thank you so much well first i'd love to hear about how you came into conservation in this line of work i personally grew up in south florida and throughout my childhood teenage years the beach the ocean have always held a big space in my heart what about you right yeah so i grew up in the prairies of canada which makes it a little less obvious as to how i came to have such a passion for the sea but i actually did scuba dive for the first time ever when i was 14 in florida on a vacation and then just combined with my love for science and investigation and problem solving i decided to study ocean science and become a marine scientist earlier in my career i was mostly focused on the academic side doing peer research and more recently realized that doing something hands-on like the work i do with nature conservancy was going to be more meaningful given the state of the marine environment definitely i think both of us share that background i was certified as a scuba diver when i was like 17 so um that was a great way to get started in marine science and learning about marine conservation and i just love being underwater in general whenever i'm scuba diving it's it's so peaceful and calm even just listening to yourself breathe through a regulator and all the sounds from the marine life around you it's beautiful that's it you know i spent several years as a phd student and beyond that listening to the ocean one of my projects was to examine the soundscape the collection of sounds that reefs emanate from their fish and invertebrates and connect that with their biodiversity and health so i really liked this speak up for nature theme because it made me think of you know all the listening to nature i've done and how nature can kind of speak for itself if we let it oh absolutely nature is talking all the time it's just up to us to listen so the work that you're doing in the u.s virgin islands with the nature conservancy can you speak a little bit about that sure uh so now i am leading a program in saint croix in the u.s virgin islands that focuses on coral conservation uh mostly with restoration and this has been uh something that has been done a lot here over the last 10 to 15 years but now we're transitioning into what we're calling the coral innovation hub this is part research facility part coral aquaculture facility and it's really a mecca to integrate ideas and research and develop techniques to better restore and conserve coral reefs i love it i love the notion of an innovation hub i mean when you're leveraging science and technology it's so critical in order to advance conservation can you share a little bit more about the groundbreaking work that you're doing in san cory yeah and so this is exactly what attracted me to the project um innovation uh science technology directly applied to something that we obviously both care about and here in our innovation hub not only can we grow coral hopefully produce the material that we need to plant reefs we also bring in scientists partners innovators technology to get our work done so we are working with people all the way from geneticists and coral microbiologists people who study coral sex people who do remote sensing and coastal engineering in order to address the problems that were faced in restoring and preserving these really important marine habitats not only that here in our um coral innovation hub we're not just isolated we're working with people across the caribbean tnc works in 17 caribbean nations or territories and so everything we do is connected and formed and disseminated across the whole region well ashley it's clear that you're doing a lot to protect our oceans and in turn speak up for nature thank you so much for this great dialogue and and all the amazing things that you're doing for our planet i hope those of you watching feel just as energized as i do to continue advocating for not just our ocean but nature overall thanks again for your time and hard work great to see you too hi everyone i'm ashlyn cousteau and i'm philippe cousteau we are journalists authors parents and ocean explorers so we are delighted to join forces with a nature conservancy to speak up for nature specifically our ocean and inspire others to take action for the planet as we do with our books television series like awesome planet and of course the work we do with young people through our non-profit organization earth echo international now we all understand that we're facing a climate emergency and our ocean is taking the heat it absorbs 90 percent of the heat and nearly one third of the carbon dioxide from greenhouse gas emissions and nearly every corner of the ocean has been touched by human impact or extraction but the good news is that young people across the globe are speaking up for the ocean and recognizing that it is a powerful source of solutions for our climate crisis they're leading the way towards a more sustainable and just future for all of us we're excited to join them and the nature conservancy to speak up for nature on earth day and every day well friends it's time for our final speaker today and i am absolutely delighted to introduce one of the nature conservancy's own staff julie robinson the director of our belize program julie leads a small but very mighty team of five people in belize and you will be absolutely blown away by the work this team does under her leadership their passion and commitment to community should serve as an inspiration to us all julie welcome thank you jen it's wonderful to be here so great to have you here now before we get started i think we have some incredible news to announce which just happened in belize so we're going to start there can you tell us a little bit about the maya forest project and what was just announced today well first of all let me say happy earth day this is just an amazing day we just we just protected close to 236 000 acres of the belize maya forest from deforestation i mean this is not only a huge win for tnt it is a massive win for nature and a huge win for blesians as well during a pandemic no less um you know just to give you a little history of this i mean this started you know decades ago back in the 90s tnc helped to protect the adjacent property which is about 260 000 acres which is the rio bravo conservation management area that's currently being managed by a local ngo program for belize and combined these two properties actually represent 9 of lisa's landmass this area it's its core habitat for endangered and threatened species it's home to all five cats that roam central america and it's a stronghold for the jaguar and it is a tropical biodiversity hot spot patchwork of forest savannah wetlands hundreds of species of trees and birds many of which migrate from you know north america and this is really all part of a bigger puzzle piece within the 30 plus million acre silver maya forest which spans across guatemala mexico and belize and is the second largest remaining tropical forest in latin america well actually in all of the americas so you know it's just it's amazing it's super important for many reasons it's important for climate um you know nature is vital for us to um solve the climate crisis uh this forest holds fast amounts of carbon and the protection of it will keep that carbon in nature there'll be this i think this represents sort of one of the most important natural solutions that that we have in fighting against climate change but also you know it's not only about preserving nature you know we're also preserving culture um dotted throughout the site there are sacred mayan ceremonial sites and there's also a series of interconnected um cenotes that we call the sacred pools of carablanca these are places where you know a thousand years ago mayans would make pilgrimages particularly during times of drought and the area has you know long been abandoned many hundreds of years ago and the amazing thing is that this is right here in our home and very few belizeans know about this important part of our history and even fewer get to see it not even i have had an opportunity to visit these pools as yet which i hope to correct very very soon by the way um and you know i just want to say that this was also this was accomplished through a coalition of like over a dozen local and international departure partners and i don't dare start to try and list who those partners are for fear of actually forgetting somebody um but it was really accomplished through a partnership where we purchased this property from a foreign company that was using it for sustainable logging um and so and that going back that cultural heritage has really been locked up for decades you know the the mine culture we did not have access to that property now we are bringing it back to police for belgians and you know we're establishing we've established a local non-profit it's called the belize maya forest trust that will manage and protect this property in perpetuity for the government and people of belize so it's really my hope that we'll be able to reconnect people back to these sacred cultural sites and manage a property in a way that benefits not only nature but also our people that is absolutely fantastic well congratulations i know that you and your team have worked so hard to get to this point in working very closely with the local communities and of course the local government and the national government of belize to support this from happening and as we know this land was really under threat from complete conversion to farmland that was the other buyer that was potentially looking at this land so we're so happy that we were able to keep the forest standing for as you say the the people of belize so tell us a little bit more about what that means culturally for belizeans to have protected with the adjacent adjacent property almost nine percent of belize what does that mean tell us more well relations we have a deep deep connection with nature we learn to value nature at a very young age so our national anthem which was um it was written in 1963 has multiple references to our natural heritage so you know it talks about nature has blessed thee with wealth untold or mountains and valleys where prairies roll it talks about coral isles and blue lagoon i mean it's just it's indoctrinated it is ingrained in us from a very very early age and we refer to belize as the jewel if you talk to any of the lesion you will hear you'll hear references to the jewel you hear the jewel we're talking about our country because we value it and we value our resources you know but like don't get me wrong well that while there's this really really strong connection there's also a drive for development as you know globally um there's a need to feed our people and you know their continued impacts from climate change means that we still have a long road ahead we still have a lot to do in our you know to to protect these resources and ensure that they're developed sustainably and this is where my team comes in and this is where that connection to nature and culture is deeply reflected you know i would not be here talking to you today about this incredible win that believes my forest if it weren't for my very tiny but very mighty team of five this team they were leading nationwide programs across the entire country from yeah working with working with communities working with private sector working with government on policy and then also touching ground on what really matters which is in the water and on land and two of the great examples of these programs are in our fisheries and aquaculture programs i have never had the privilege to work with such a dedicated bunch of people a team who really believes deeply in our values and importance of partnership and community and you know like i mentioned earlier as blesians we have this strong connection we're proud stewards of nature but don't take my word for it we have a short video that i think really brings this to life great [Music] [Music] i've been a fisherman since i was uh about 17 growing up [Music] me and my friends my age we should have like eight nine ten hug snappers just right around us now if you see one of those you're happy you don't even want to shoot it you guys are so happy to see one [Music] everybody went wild you know everybody started buying boats and heading out to see more you know stay out we used to try to save saber area by not catching young stuff you know we have a lot of cultures you have to we don't have enough enforcement [Music] all those things need to stop by whereas we're going to lose our reef you can't stop somebody from killing a paradox it's not on the ninja species list it's not on that don't take less and it hurts it hurts to see you know it's going away so fast the only way to give this the sea a good chance of surviving and replenish itself is alternative like the seaweed farm we have here you know you try to teach people how to plant seaweed so they can give the reef a little break the more seaweed we plant the more creatures we're going to have the more livelihood the whole area is going to have [Music] here the water quality is so good to say there's a lot of nutrients in it we have some people take it out to the states and done some tests on it and it says the best quality cv they ever saw worldwide and so we said you know we need other funds and we asked tnc you know which is a trust fund and we they gave us a little help and we started getting on their feet [Music] and helped us with the ropes the strings that we needed you know mind power if we needed help they push it through us you know and whatever problem you know we have we just asked them and they were always willing to give us a hand the only way to go forward is try to preserve some stuff for the younger generation because if we wipe it out then there's nothing for them to see [Music] that was fantastic so julie i can tell through our conversation how personally passionate you are and how proud you are of your team so i want to ask you a personal question what does it mean to you to be leading such an inspirational group of people in belize right now you know jen i've dreamed of doing this type of work since i was six years old um at six i said i told everybody i wanted to be a zoologist but i even went before i knew it as well it just meant i just knew that i've had this passion for nature and wanting to save everything in and around it um you know i i grew up rather than watching cartoons i'm watching john cousteau national geographic things like that at 12 um i became a member of the police audubon society i was desperate to join their field trips but i was too young later on i volunteered became an employee and eventually became a board member and my entire life i have followed my dreams um you know i've been working working in conservation now for 25 years and i can tell you that today i could not be happier my work my team my country there's really just no other place i would rather be right now and my ability to immerse my 11 year old son in this space is really and truly inspirational and what keeps me going every single day that is so wonderful julie tnc is so lucky to have you thank you for your work for your dedication for the incredible news today and for joining us on this earth day and really truly being an inspiration to us all thank you so much thank you so friends we've come to the end of our program today and i i can't believe that two hours has gone by already this was amazing i want to thank all of our wonderful speakers and special guests and i hope you are as inspired as i am by the incredible work they do every day to create a world where people and nature thrive their stories give me such hope for a brighter future and thank you everyone who joined in today for joining us today i hope that you're inspired today to speak up for nature your voice matters you can vote you can launch sustainability project at your school push your employer for more sustainable practices reach out to your elected officials talk to friends and family about climate change the list goes on and on and for more ideas of what you can do on this very important earth day and every day please visit our website nature.org again thank you for joining us and happy earth day we're so glad that you are part of our community and i'd like to actually leave you with a quote to favorite quote of mine from margaret mead never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world indeed it's the only thing that ever has thank you and happy earth day our individual voices are powerful but not everything has a voice we need to speak for those that can't for those in trouble for those in need let us be a voice to the voiceless the caretakers our home deserves let us speak for the ones that have no lungs but that fill ours with air let us shout from the mountaintops that quench our thirst if there's one thing we've learned it's that when we all come together the sky is the limit it's time to speak up for nature [Music] you

Channel: The Nature Conservancy

Views: 7,910

Rating: 4.9203982 out of 5

Keywords: the nature conservancy, nature, nature conservatory, protecting nature, preserving life

Id: uIzTI861k7A

Length: 128min 28sec (7708 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 22 2021