18 Facts About Nina Gualinga

Nina Gualinga was born on June 1993 and is an Ecuadorian environmental and indigenous rights activist.

Nina Gualinga is part of the Kichwa-speaking community and has spent most of her life advocating for better environmental protection of the Ecuadorian Amazon and the inhabitant wildlife as well as the people who are dependent on this environment.

Nina Gualinga's father is Anders Siren, a Swedish-speaking Finnish professor of biology in the department of geography and geology at the University of Turku.

Nina Gualinga witnessed how the women of her village turned down the offer, advocating for the preservation of nature.

Nina Gualinga studied at Sigtunaskolan Humanistiska Laroverket, a boarding school in Sigtuna, returning to Sarayaku during school holidays.

Nina Gualinga gained her knowledge of the forest through her parents and grandparents.

Nina Gualinga is a granddaughter of Cristina Gualinga, and Gualinga's sister, Helena Gualinga, and mother, Noemi Gualinga are environmental activists.

Nina Gualinga's aunt Patricia is a land defender, and her uncle Eriberto is a filmmaker who documents the Sarayaku resistance.

Nina Gualinga is currently studying human rights at Lund University.

Nina Gualinga's family was active in the Kichwa Sarayaku community's fight against the exploitation of the Amazon rainforest by companies and the Ecuadorian government.

At the age of 18, Nina Gualinga represented the youth of Sarayaku at the final hearing of the case.

Nina Gualinga had an indigenous fellowship at Amazon Watch where she developed the proposal for her own non-governmental organization aimed at empowering indigenous Sarayaku's youth and women, and to protect the Southern Ecuadorian Amazon.

Nina Gualinga is active as an indigenous rights activist on an international level, with a focus on protecting homes and land against corporate interests.

Nina Gualinga was part of a global call to stop fossil fuel extraction at the 2014 People's Climate March.

Nina Gualinga was among the delegates advocating for "Living Forests" protection at the global climate conferences COP20 and COP21, in Lima and Paris respectively.

Nina Gualinga shed more light on the effects of climate change on the Kichwa people at the COP22 in Marrakech and encouraged the government to prioritize climate actions to reduce carbon emissions for the indigenous people.

Nina Gualinga was part of the Women's Earth and Climate Action Network, Amazon Watch and Sarayaku Delegation to COP23 in Bonn and a speaker at the event.

Nina Gualinga was part of the WECAN delegation at the COP25 climate negotiations in Madrid in 2019.