Learnings from Climate Week NYC
Last week, New York City once again became the global stage for climate action as leaders, activists, innovators, and businesses converged for Climate Week NYC 2025. Rooms across the city were filled to the brim to hear from diverse panels and engage in strategic discussions; the mood was energized, and the need for meaningful action to protect people, forests, and biodiversity has never felt stronger. The week highlighted both the scale of the crisis and the creativity of those determined to confront it – and most importantly, it reaffirmed the need to fund climate solutions at the source and the importance of Planetary Health at the center of the climate movement. Here’s what Health In Harmony led on and learned.
Community-led storytelling is more powerful than ever
Climate solutions must be rooted in the leadership of those who have always protected rainforests and the biodiversity within them. Storytelling is an essential strategy for progress – not just to inform, but to demonstrate Indigenous leadership, build solidarity locally and globally, and drive systems-level change. Community-led storytelling from Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities must be prioritized; at HIH, in collaboration with partner If Not Us Then Who?, we platform storytelling alongside carbon and biodiversity data. Recognizing that we must uphold data sovereignty, and also that climate data and research is simply not creating the urgent action needed – but with storytelling, the urgency and potential is resonating. As environmental activist and If Not Us Then Who? Training Lead Yurshell Rodríguez put it at Climate Week NYC:
In a time of climate crisis and social unrest, journalism and community storytelling help reclaim our narratives and defend our territories. Authentic, community-led storytelling reclaims narrative sovereignty. It means we are not just subjects of the documentary—we are the filmmakers, the photographers, the journalists. It means we tell the stories of our struggles, resistance, and solutions from our own voices, with our own aesthetics, in our own languages.
— Yurshell Rodríguez, If Not Us Then Who?
At the event Forest Guardianship: Stories from the Frontlines of Climate Action, Health In Harmony platformed the powerful documentary Yanuni with its Executive Producer and Sound Designer, Eric Terena. Created by Richard Ladkani and co-produced by Indigenous leader Juma Xipaia and Leonardo DiCaprio, Yanuni focuses on Juma’s story with the Xipaya People in Middle Xingu within the Amazon, documenting environmental destruction and cultural resistance, making visible struggles often ignored by mainstream media and urging audiences to support and act on Indigenous-led solutions.
“The impact is not all in your place, it’s not all in your city, the impact is in all those [Indigenous] communities, all those lands, and the Indigenous communities now need to mitigate the climate crisis’ impact, and this is the message of [Yanuni]: we need to come together to bring the solution together and make a difference for the next generation.”
Indigenous filmmaker Alcibiades Rodriguez spoke alongside Yurshell while screening the first set of ‘Community Thriving Narrative’ (CTN) film trailers, made by the Alto Playón, Puerto Lara, Emberá, and Arimae Indigenous Peoples in Panama. Beginning in December 2024, this initiative was developed by If Not Us Then Who?, Health In Harmony, and FSC Indigenous Foundation (FSC-IF) to amplify the voice of Indigenous communities in Panama through storytelling and media training. The CTN training, led by Alcibiades’ Ulu Films, saw over 40 participants engage in three-day, in-person workshops on media creation, covering framing, lighting, sound, and smartphone filmmaking. CTN seeks not just to teach skills and focus on consent and community ownership, but to build capacity for storytelling that bridges community health, sustainability, and climate justice. The films will launch officially later in October 2025.
Convening with key collaborators is a crucial tool
On Tuesday evening, September 23, we convened partner organizations for an evening of strategic network weaving, designed to synergize messaging, deepen collaboration, and cultivate authentic partnerships. Unwind for the Earth: An Evening of Relaxed Climate Conversation brought together partner organizations including Project Dandelion, Planet Indonesia, Rights and Resources International, Woodwell Climate and Research Center, If Not Us Then Who?, and Pawanka Fund. The space highlighted the importance of connection and strategic engagement in climate justice to lead us in key actions, messages, and ambition ahead of COP30.
Novia Sagita of Planet Indonesia and Yurshell Rodriguez from If Not Us Then Who? shared the importance of Indigenous-led stories and solutions, and we also heard from Nigerian human rights activist Hafsat Abiola about Project Dandelion, a women-led global campaign for climate justice. This collective is inspired by the resilience of the dandelion: “Its roots are regenerative of soil, all parts of the Dandelion can be consumed, and it spreads by blowing in the wind. It has one goal - to seed more dandelions.” During her remarks, Abiola invited all of the young people present to the front of the room to affirm our commitment to their future and increasing leadership.
This October, Project Dandelion will launch a bold initiative to reframe investment in these women as the most strategic climate action we can take. Read more and join the movement here.
Multiple viewpoints led to generative conversations
Coming together for change and building alliances has always been part of HIH’s approach, which is why HIH and partners convened at a series of panels, speeches, and screenings across Climate Week NYC with partner organizations including Pawanka Fund, Woodwell Climate Research Center and Foundation Prince Albert II of Monaco. Together, we discussed the importance of listening to Indigenous voices and investing in their solutions as not only an effective but essential path to protecting forests and the future we share.
Ahead of COP30 in Brazil, it was promising to hear from other organizations that share in this goal. Under the #ThePledgeWeWant, If Not Us Then Who?, Tenure Facility, Rights and Resources Initiative, and other partners are coming together to call for deep and meaningful commitments to local communities at COP30, building on the pledges made at COP26 four years ago. The Indigenous-led campaign ‘The Answer Is Us’, meanwhile, was born from the call of Indigenous Peoples of the Amazon Basin and Brazil and created by COIAB (Coordination of Indigenous Organizations of the Brazilian Amazon) in June 2024. In February 2025, the Global Alliance of Territorial Communities joined the campaign, making it global and expanding its reach to local communities in other countries.
To read more about how Health In Harmony supports these goals, read our Road to COP30 blog.