Te Ara Whatu
“Te Ara Whatu” know that Māori and Pasifika communities are at the frontline of climate change. In 2017 Te Ara Whatu attended COP23 in Bonn, Germany as the first indigenous youth delegation to attend the UN Climate Talks.
With historic environmental destruction, cultural harm done to indigenous communities by the fossil fuel industry, rising sea levels and increasing droughts, climate change has drastically altered what it means to be a young person in this time in history. They have made it their mission to understand this and attend climate talks — to push for solutions that centre the needs of our peoples, to act in solidarity with our indigenous communities from around the world and learn from experts.
“Our people have been experiencing the impacts of the climate crisis for decades. As rangatahi we have to face these challenges head on and hold those responsible to account. We do this to ensure that our culture, grounded in our whenua, our whakapapa and our whānau is protected in global solutions to climate change”
Starting this organisation was a huge step up in solidarity with indigenous communities from around the world. Their goal is to “see our mahi as part of a bigger kaupapa of resistance and re-indigenisation.
Climate justice recognises the oppressive power structures that have contributed to the causes of climate change and their intersectional relationship with other challenges that our communities face: gender violence, food sovereignty, cultural integrity and land threats.”
The meaning of their name is as follows:
In Te Reo Māori, ‘ara’ translates to rise or wake up, or is the name given to a path or route, or the breaking of waters in the commencement of childbirth.
Whatu translates to the eye or pupil, or references a stone of initiation or rāhui, or to weave together.
Simply, Te Ara Whatu means The Woven Path, but its layers of meaning capture the broader kaupapa that the fight for climate justice connects to.
See more of their work down below.