In their own words

When a silver mining company wanted to establish a mine in the Xinka town of San Rafael las Flores, Guatemala, Marisol Guerra knew it was a bad idea. Executives touted the company’s commitment to community rights and the environment. But they didn’t consult with the Xinka people about those rights or how the mining operation would impact their health.

Guerra and others fought back, enduring intimidation and injuries from attackers even after Guatemalan courts suspended the company’s license to operate for lack of free, prior, and informed consultation. “For exercising our fundamental democratic rights, we are faced with persecution, criminalization, and death threats,” Guerra said.

Oxfam has spoken out for years about oil and mining companies that have retaliated against people who raise concerns about their projects, and we know that the stories of women and communities on the frontlines—the people who are grappling with the extraction of their resources and the loss of their land, forests, and water—are often overlooked. That’s why in 2021 Oxfam launched the Climate Media Collaborative (CMC), a program that invests in communications to protect and amplify these voices. Funded by the Ford Foundation, the CMC works with activists in 12 countries to tell their own stories.

Over the course of three years, the CMC has joined frontline organizations, digital communications agencies, and journalism platforms, and has connected activists to national, regional, and international climate debates. CMC participants have contributed to conversations around the climate COPs and U.N. climate forums, and have taken part in consultations around the Escazú Agreement, a regional agreement on access to information, public participation, and environmental justice in the Caribbean and Latin America.

These activists have created an abundance of creative products for local and national audiences, including videos, documentaries, audiovisual material, and social media campaigns, to build digital media engagement on Facebook, X, and YouTube about particular campaigns or issues. These products are bringing attention to new climate narratives and highlighting local demands and solutions—and also inspiring accountability on the part of local and national governments and companies.

Here are a few of the CMC’s successes

• Communities in Senegal partnered with West African press to create local stories that were used to advocate for a just energy transition during the U.N. Climate Change Conference in 2022. This project contributed to the approval of the “loss and damage” fund to help Global South countries adapt to the realities of climate change.
• Oxfam and partners produced the documentary Hold the Line, which profiles environmental activists in South Africa, Colombia, and the U.S. The film has screened at film festivals and global gatherings, and with Oxfam supporters and policymakers in Washington, D.C., and New York.
• In Zimbabwe, partners produced an environmental programming series online to motivate and inspire young people to climate activism. It reached 20,000 people.
• The Somos Centroamérica campaign, which reached 1,034,077 people, invited youth to submit songs, videos, illustrations, and photos about their challenges and hopes for the region. Several submissions reflected the demands and desires of frontline communities on climate issues.
• Original reporting by Mongabay, a nonprofit conservation and environmental science news platform we partnered with to tell stories about land rights, environmental crimes, community conservation strategies, and energy and climate policies, has been picked up by more than 100 news outlets, including The New York Times, Al Jazeera, and MSN.