The Invisible Farmer Project is Australia’s largest-ever study of women farmers. The project, a 3-year nationwide partnership between rural women, academic researchers, the Australian government, and cultural organizations, aims to document the vital role of women in agriculture to assist the development of gender-sensitive public policy. Photo credit: Museums Victoria
This article at the 1 Million Women website, written by Alice Payne, presents the issue of fast fashion, with the cycle of new products being faster every season, which leads to the unsustainable issue of overconsumption in Australia (including popular stores such as Zara and Topshop). Payne analyses the results of this practice, such as rising fiber prices and the increase of purchases of clothes overseas, then introduces possible adaptation measures, including recycling materials for a more sustainable clothing industry. Photo credit: 1millionwomen
This article from 1 Million Women presents results on research about low-energy houses as opposed to regular houses, which take up a lot of energy and are a great factor of global carbon emissions. Specifically, it analyses the Lochiel Park Green Village in the South of Australia, a neighborhood of 103 zero-energy houses. Among the results are the significant health improvements on the people living in these sustainable homes, including a decision to quit smoking cigarettes by a woman living in one of the environmentally-friendly places. The advantages are also economic, as not having to pay energy bills saves a great amount of money for the residents. Photo credit: 1 Million Women
1 Million Women provides tips for people who want to be part of the change in climate action but prefer quieter efforts over marching or public speaking. It showcases female activists including the Knitting Nanas, a team of grandmas who care about the impact of exploring natural gas; Wendy Bowman, leader in the fight against coal expansion; and the Clean Coast Collective, an Australian couple who engages youth in cleaning the beaches. Photo credit: 1 Million Women
Eleanor Dixon, a Marlinja woman and leader in the Stand up for Country Indigenous anti-fracking movement, discusses the impacts of fracking on her ancestral lands. Dixon criticizes the Australian government for attempting to turn this site into a gas field without consulting the Aboriginal people. She emphasizes the interconnected nature of the water system, land, people, food systems and cultural identity in her homeland, and argues for keeping all that is sacred beneath the ground. Photo credit: Eleanor Dixon/Facebook
Women staff members from 1 Million Women, a nonprofit based in Australia, took part in the 2017 Plastic Free July Challenge and shared their experiences in this blog. Founder and CEO Natalie Isaacs argued that it is critical to limit our individual impact on the environment in the age of climate change so in pledging to get as close to plastic-free as possible in their lives, staff members made meaningful strides toward reducing waste. Photo credit: 1 Million Women
In 2013, Alice Eather, an Indigenous activist and poet from Australia’s Northern Territories, discovered that Paltar Petroleum had applied to frack the ocean of her community of Maningrida. Alice cofounded the Protect Arnhem Land campaign group, which mobilized local communities to oppose the project. In 2016 the company withdrew its permit application. Eather will be remembered for her fierce poetry, as memorialized in the documentary Stingray Sisters. Photo credit: ABC
Aboriginal activist Murrawah Johnson is fighting for self-determination for the Indigenous Wangan and Jagalingou people. For the past two years, after being named spokeswoman of the Wangan and Jagalingou Traditional Owners’ Council, Johnson has been the public face of the campaign to protect her country from the proposed Adani Carmichael coal mine on the Galilee Basin. She has travelled across Australia and the world, lobbying big banks and investors, and gave a keynote address at the largest Aboriginal conference on the circuit, the National Native Title Conference. Photo credit: The Saturday Paper
Indigenous Murri woman Teila Watson explains how her people historically lived a life of abundance and autonomy, all the while maintaining a proper relationship with lands and people. To combat global warming, she asserts that First Nations sovereignty and governance is the best chance Australia has. Photo credit: IndigenousX
One Billion Rising Sydney is organized by Asian Women at Work Inc (AWatW) and Migrate Australia-NSW. They joined the Women’s March to Ban the Bomb action to urge the Australian government to sign the UN Convention to Ban Nuclear Weapons. The protest happened with music and singing and also included the participation of WILPF (Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom) and ICAN Australia (International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons). AWatW is an organization focused on migrant women workers conditions in Australia, defending their rights and trying to promote their right to good life conditions. Photo credit: One Billion Rising
Michelle Kovacevic pledged to adjust her lifestyle to have less impact on the environment and hopes that by doing her part, she will inspire others to take action on climate change. As part of her pledge, she factors in her personal contribution to pollution whenever she decides how to travel for work, for example, choosing trains or automobiles instead of flying. She also bicycles more and invests in renewable energy research, among other eco-conscious choices. Her pledge is part of the Victoria Government’s TAKE2 collective climate initiative to support individuals, businesses, government entities, and community organizations in reaching net zero emissions by 2050. Photo credit: Shuttershock
Larissa Baldwin is the national co-director of the Seed Indigenous Youth Climate Network, which addresses the impact of climate change on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people through numerous campaigns. Baldwin asserts the need for an indigenous-led climate movement and explains how the environmental concerns of Indigenous people frequently overlap with broader issues of colonialism, systemic racism and land rights.
Murrawah Johnson, an Indigenous woman leader and campaigner with the Wangan and Jagalingou People's Family Council, puts into historical context the Indigenous resistance to the Adani Carmichael mine and other oil and gas projects. She argues that the 229 years of Australian state history can be understood as a struggle over land and land rights, with Black Resistance as a powerful force that has always contexted the dispossession of Indigenous lands and continues to do so in resisting fossil fuel extraction. A new generation of young Indigenous activists and organizers are taking up the task of defending their natural heritage. Photo credit: Murrawah Johnson
Vanessa Farrelly, a Southern Arrernte woman and a passionate anti-fracking activist with the Seed Youth Indigenous Climate Action Network, is becoming a powerful advocate. She and 80 other women participated in the 2016 Straight Talk forum, run by Oxfam, which connected Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women to the political system to spark change in their communities. Indigenous women took vows to speak up against climate destruction, as many Parliamentarians in attendance left saying they were profoundly moved by the commitment they had witnessed. Photo credit: Adrienne Francis
The Institute for Figuring is an organization that makes use of art to tackle science education, and it was founded by twin sisters Margaret and Christine Wertheim from Queensland, Australia. The Wertheim sister started a project called Crochet Coral Reef, in which they stitched their own woolen reef ecosystem, having been exhibited all over Europe and in the United States. Photo credit: Jenna Bascom/Courtesy of the Museum of Arts and Design
Seed is Australia’s first Indigenous youth climate network, working to build a movement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people for climate justice. Seed identifies that although climate change is one of the greatest threats to our world, it also brings opportunity to create a more just and sustainable world. The organization is being lead by 3 young local women, including Amelia Telford, who are working directly with the people impacted by climate change. Photo credit: Seeds
The best way to make people understand climate change, says performer-activist Latai Taumoepeau, is not to use maps, charts and diagrams, but rather the human body. Taumoepeau is one of three performers exploring climate change in the Pacific region in Disaffected, a multi-disciplinary theatre work premiering at the Blacktown Arts Centre in Sydney. The work explores experiences of displacement, devastation and rebuilding at the hands of natural disasters that communities in the Pacific live as a daily reality. Photo credit: Katy Green Loughrey
When Adani Group announced plans to dig Australia’s largest coal mine ever, the open-pit Carmichael Mine, the mining consortium underestimated the power of the Wangan and Jagalingou Family Council and People who are the traditional owners of the land for 60,000 years. Murrawah Johnson and her uncle Adrian Burragubba embarked on an 18-day world tour to meet with the international banks funding the mine to convince them to back out. As a result of their efforts, fifteen of the world’s top 20 fossil fuel investors pulled support for the mine. Murrawah Johnson has been characterised as one of the most dynamic climate activists as she is always on the front line of holding back the largest proposed coal mine in the world. Photo credit: grist 50!
As a young Aboriginal woman, Angel Owen cares about environmental destruction on more than just a physical level. When her family went through huge upheaval during Australia’s 2013 floods, she was moved to join the movement of Aboriginal, Torres Strait and Pacific Islanders in opposing offshore coal projects through the Break Free movement. Attending the National Indigenous Youth Leadership Academy, Angel continued to hone her skills as an organizer, while dreaming of pursuing climate justice one day through law school. Photo credit: Valerie Bichard
The best way to make people understand climate change, says performer-activist Latai Taumoepeau, is not to use maps, charts and diagrams, but rather the human body. Taumoepeau is one of three performers exploring climate change in the Pacific region in Disaffected, a multi-disciplinary theatre work premiering at the Blacktown Arts Centre in Sydney. The work explores experiences of displacement, devastation and rebuilding at the hands of natural disasters that communities in the Pacific live as a daily reality. Photo credit: Katy Green Loughrey
Women represent only 16 percent of board positions and 14 percent of senior manager positions across the top 200 global utilities, despite women being a critical resource against climate change, and gender diversity contributing to the development of renewable energy. Deborah Oberon of AllGrid Energy, Isabelle Kocher of Engie, and Catherine Tanna of EnergyAustralia are among this group of women leaders advancing practical strategies for renewable energy development.
Angela, Dominique and Theresa were arrested for locking themselves to the gates of a waste treatment site for 850 coal seam gas wells. The women, who are part of anti-coal seam gas group The Knitting Nannas, were charged and released but vow to continue their protest against the project. Photo credit: Facebook
The Northern Territory's Growling Grannies, a coalition of aboriginal elders and activists, are taking a stand against the Northern Territory government and fracking companies. They are taking a stand against the selling off their lands for risky shale gas fracking. In this video they call for a meeting with the NT government and the Northern Land Council to tell them that fracking harms the country, their water, and the health of future generations. Photo credit: Frack-Free NT
Amelia Telford, a Bundjalung woman, began her personal journey with activism at a young age, when she began protesting the loss of the Great Barrier Reef off the coast of Queensland. She founded the Seed Indigenous Youth Climate Action Network and has been named the Australian Geographic Society's Young Conservationist of the Year. With her confidence in the voices of Indigenous people and her drive to start an energy revolution, Amelia has been working to bring a message to the Australian government: use the sun and wind, not fossil fuels. Photo credit: James Brickwood
Amelia Telford is the founder and director of Seed, a network of young Aboriginal people fighting for climate justice. Observing sea levels rising in the Torres Strait, bush fires and drought, she advocated for swift action on climate change for her country at the COP 21 climate talks in Paris in 2015. Photo credit: James Brickwood
Dr. Michelle Deshong of the Kuku Yulanji and Butchulla Nations speaks about how Black and Indigenous women have helped movements for civil rights in Australia and worldwide. Drawing on historical examples, she highlights women’s leadership in the fights for Aboriginal and Indigenous rights in this TedX talk. Photo credit: TedXJCUCairns
Murrawah Johnson, a young Indigenous woman from Australia’s Wangan and Jagalingou Family Council and People, has caused a myriad of legal and financial problems for one mining consortium. With the help of the Seed Youth Indigenous Climate Network, she embarked on an 18-day world tour to meet with the international banks funding the mine to personally convince them to back out of the Adani Group’s proposed open-pit Carmichael Mine, which would have been Australia’s largest-ever coal mine. Fifteen pulled their support, rendering the project dead in its tracks. The Wangan and Jagalingou are the traditional owners of the land and rivers in the area, and trace their heritage back 60,000 years. Photo credit: Grist
In this poem, Alice Eather, one of the leaders of the Protect Arnhem Land Campaign, poetically recounts the need to fight against the offshore exploration, mining and drilling that is threatening the entire coastline of Australia’s Northern Territory region, her home. Arnhem Land is a sacred area in the most northern region of the Australian Northern Territory. It is home to the oldest living culture of Indigenous peoples existing on the planet today. The last remaining existence of this ancient, traditional culture and its practices is under threat. Photo credit: Luka Lesson
1 Million Women, founded by Natalie Isaacs in 2009, has become the largest women’s environmental organization in Australia, with nearly 83,000 women cutting over 100,000 tonnes of carbon pollution through small daily acts and coordinated mobilizations. When they reach their target of a million women as members and over a million tonnes of CO2 pollution saved, they will have generated carbon reductions equivalent to taking 240,000 cars off the road for a year. Photo credit: UN.org
Located on the eastern shore of Australia’s tropical North, Shiptons Flat is home to Marilyn, a Kuku Nyungkal Aboriginal woman. She has been practicing her ancestral way of life here, far removed from the services and conveniences of cities. In this video she discusses how she walks the Nyungkal bubu country like her ancestors before her, acknowledging and conversing with the Spirit beings around her. She discusses how much of her knowledge has been re-worked due to climate change within the parameters of her Indigenous learning and beliefs. Photo credit: United Nations University
This paper, by Georgina Murray and David Peetz of Griffith University in Brisbane, uses oral history to explore the gendered historical experiences of coal mining towns in the Bowen Basin. The Bowen Basin is home to vast reserves of coal, which underwent a boom in the 20th century that resulted in vast profits for some but poverty for many of the community’s members.
