We envision a world that honors and values cultural and biological diversity and the critical contribution of tropical rainforests to our planet's life support system. We believe that indigenous self-determination is a critical component of any successful conservation strategy for the Amazon, and see that indigenous knowledge, cultures and traditional practices contribute greatly to sustainable and equitable stewardship of Mother Earth. We strive for a world in which governments, corporations and civil society respect the collective rights of indigenous peoples to free, prior and informed consent over any activity affecting their territories and resources. We commit, in the spirit of partnership and mutual respect, to support our indigenous allies in their efforts to protect life, land, and culture in accordance with their aspirations and needs, as well as the needs of future generations.

Amazon Watch is a nonprofit organization founded in 1996 to protect the rainforest and advance the rights of indigenous peoples in the Amazon Basin. We partner with indigenous and environmental organizations in campaigns for human rights, corporate accountability and the preservation of the Amazon's ecological systems.

Rainforests sustain us. They help regulate the global climate and are vital to maintaining the earth's fragile balance. The Amazon rainforest is the world's largest and most biodiverse tropical rainforest, covering an area larger than the continental United States. It houses one-third of the Earth's plant and animal species and produces one-fifth of all its flowing fresh water.

Nearly 400 distinct indigenous peoples depend on the Amazon rainforest for their physical and cultural survival. At current rates of deforestation, nearly 50 percent of the Amazon could be lost or severely degraded by the year 2020, and the vast majority will no longer be in a pristine state.

With global deforestation contributing 2025 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions, Amazon Watch and our indigenous partners are providing a service to all humanity as we together seek to defend the rainforest. Each of us can take action. We may be the last generation that has a chance to protect this precious gem of our world's cultural and ecological heritage an irreplaceable source of life and inspiration.

Stop Amazon Destruction: Amazon Watch resists the destruction

of the Amazon by challenging disastrous development projects and resource extraction and by promoting indigenous rights.

Advance Indigenous Solutions: Amazon Watch supports and promotes indigenous-led alternative solutions to climate change, natural resource extraction, and industrial development.

Support Climate Justice: Amazon Watch joins with the climate justice movement to address the fact that the most vulnerable — especially indigenous people and people of color — bear the brunt of environmental

destruction, corporate greed, and climate change, and are often excluded from top-down solutions.

It costs only $.03 per acre per year to support Amazon Watch's

work with indigenous peoples to protect more than 60 million acres of rainforest from oil development, natural resource extraction and industrial development.

2018-2019 PRIORITIES

STOP AMAZON DESTRUCTION

Amazon Watch resists the destruction of the Amazon by challenging disastrous development projects and resource extraction and by promoting indigenous rights.

1. Continue to develop our End Amazon Crude campaign, with a particular focus on the financiers of Amazonian oil companies, while deepening ties with California policymakers and forging a diverse and effective campaign coalition.

2. Work with Ecuadorian and global partners to halt the country's planned new auction of oil drilling concessions that threaten vast, pristine forests and the peoples who call them home.

3. Strengthen our campaign alongside Peru's Achuar people and a coalition of partners to force GeoPark to abandon its Amazonian oil concession.

4. Slow Brazil's ongoing assault on the Amazon, environmental regulations, and indigenous territorial rights by exposing and severing international market and investment ties to corrupt government leaders linked to the agribusiness sector.

ADVANCE INDIGENOUS SOLUTIONS

Amazon Watch supports and promotes indigenous-led alternative solutions to climate change, natural resource extraction, and industrial development.

1. Scale up a robust and replicable Power to the Protectors program to deliver solar energy, communications, and transport solutions to remote Amazonian indigenous communities.

2. Support indigenous-led efforts to advance visions and proposals for a permanently protected Sacred Headwaters bio-cultural region located between the Napo and Maraà ±Ãƒ ³n rivers in the Amazon.

3. Formalize and expand our Amazon Protectors Fund to meet the growing financial needs of both established and new grassroots partners.

SUPPORT CLIMATE JUSTICE

Amazon Watch joins with the climate justice movement to address the fact that the most vulnerable — especially indigenous people and people of color — bear the brunt of environmental destruction, corporate greed, and climate change, and are often excluded from top-down solutions.

1. Scale up a robust and replicable Power to the Protectors program to deliver solar energy, communications, and transport solutions to remote Amazonian indigenous communities.

2. Support indigenous-led efforts to advance visions and proposals for a permanently protected Sacred Headwaters bio-cultural region located between the Napo and Maraà ±Ãƒ ³n rivers in the Amazon.

3. Formalize and expand our Amazon Protectors Fund to meet the growing financial needs of both established and new grassroots partners.

1. Build partnerships with research and media organizations and hone our visual storytelling on the importance of indigenous climate leadership.

2. Support inter-ethnic and international alliance-building between indigenous peoples of the North and South calling for climate justice.

3. Grow support for Earth Defenders of the Amazon through advocacy before national and international authorities, emergency response, and communications to amplify the message of indigenous leaders and communities that are at the frontlines of protecting the Amazon rainforest.

4. Support and advance proposals by indigenous women and youth on the frontlines of ecological destruction and climate change in the Amazon.

Leila Salazar-LÃ ³pez, Executive Director

Leila is a mother; proud Chicana-Latina woman; and passionate defender of Mother Earth, the Amazon, indigenous rights and climate justice. Since 2015 she has served as the Executive Director of Amazon Watch, leading the organization in its work to protect and defend the bio-cultural and climate integrity of the Amazon rainforest by advancing indigenous peoples' rights, territories, and solutions. For 20+ years Leila has worked to defend the world's rainforests, human rights, and the climate through grassroots organizing and international advocacy campaigns at Amazon Watch, Rainforest Action Network, Global Exchange, and Green Corps. She is a 1998 graduate of the University of California at Santa Barbara. Leila lives in San Francisco, CA with her husband and two young daughters.

Atossa Soltani (Director, President of the Board, member since 1997)

Atossa Soltani the founder and board president of Amazon Watch and served as the organization's first Executive Director for eighteen years. She is currently a senior strategist for the Amazon Sacred Headwaters Initiative, working to protect one of the most biodiverse ecosystems on Earth. Atossa is the Hillary Institute 2013 Global Laureate for Climate Leadership and recipient of the 2014 Hillary Step Prize. She is currently producing her first feature-length documentary film titled The Flow about learning from nature's genius.

Follow Atossa on Twitter: @asoltani

Richard Wegman (Director, Board Chair, member since 2009)

Richard's activism spans 47 years of volunteering and working for peace, conservation, health, music and the environment. Holding a BS in marketing and an MBA in finance, he brings astute knowledge of business to his work. Currently, he is Development Director for AfricaASAP, an organization that is helping to save Elephants in Africa. He also serves on the Boards of Amazon Heart of Yoga, Social and Environmental Entrepreneurs, and EarthTones.

Andrew Beath (Director, Treasurer of the Board, member since 1997)

Andrew is Founder and Executive Director of EarthWays Foundation, Founder and Board President of Social and Environmental Entrepreneurs (SEE), and Author of Conscious Activism.

Michelle Chan (Director and Vice-Chair, member since 2009)

Michelle is the Economic Policy Program Director of Friends of the Earth and founder of BankTrack, an international NGO network. She has served on the Board of CERES, the Council for Responsible Public Investment, and the Rose Foundation for Communities and the Environment. She is also a founding member of the Dow Jones Sustainability Index Advisory Committee.

Branden Barber (Director, member since 2010)

Branden has moved from activism to marketing to design to management to business and back to activism over the last 25 years. In 2016, he founded Branden Barber & Associates, a fundraising and development consulting group. Branden was part of the leadership team at Rainforest Action Network for five years as their Development Director and was Director of Engagement at Amazon Watch for two. He is on the Steering Committee of the Kindle Project (an ardent supporter of Amazon Watch), the Advisory Board of the Borneo Project, and the Honorary Board of the International Accountability Project.

Adeline Cassin (Director and Secretary, member since 2015)

Adeline Cassin has dedicated her life to merging the art of storytelling with the power of technology to inspire the world about this magnificent planet we call home. Adeline has been an integral leader in the launches of CNN in Latin America, Discovery Kids, Home&Health, and Discovery Digital, educating and engaging millions with the fascinating world we live in. When taking a brief respite from dreaming up the next way to empower audiences into positive action as game changers for our collective future, Adeline can be found in the Amazon, where her heart resides.

Kenneth Greenstein (Director, member since 2015)

Ken has been an environmental and social justice activist for more than 30 years. As a tenant attorney with his San Francisco based firm Greenstein and McDonald, Ken has been assisting tenants for 17 years, and the firm has helped tenants secure an excess of $40 million. Ken is on the Board of Directors of International Rivers and the Advisory Board for the Accountability Counsel and was on the Board of the National Lawyers Guild. He is a former student body president at UC Santa Barbara.

Antonia Juhasz (Director, member since 2019)

Antonia is a leading energy analyst, author, and investigative journalist specializing in oil. An award-winning writer, her articles appear in Newsweek, Rolling Stone, Harper's Magazine, The Atlantic, CNN.com, The Nation, Ms., The Advocate, and many more. Antonia is the author of three books: Black Tide (2011), The Tyranny of Oil (2008), and The Bush Agenda (2006).

Ana Maria Mahiri (Director, member since 2006)

Director of the U'wa Defense Project from 2002-2006, Ana is of Indigenous Colombian ancestry. She has over ten years of experience working with Native communities in the Americas, focused on Indigenous-led community development and cultural survival.

Ahmed Rahim (Director, member since 2012)

Co-founder, CEO and alchemist behind Numi Organic Tea, the largest organic, fair trade tea company in North America. Before starting the Numi business in 1999, Ahmed studied Theater and Psychology and then spent a decade living, working and traveling throughout Europe as a professional film maker and photographer and made documentaries of impoverished areas and war zones across the world.

Leila Salazar-Lopez (Executive Director, member since 2015)

Leila is a mother; proud Chicana-Latina woman; and passionate defender of Mother Earth, the Amazon, indigenous rights and climate justice. Since 2015 she has served as the Executive Director of Amazon Watch, leading the organization in its work to protect and defend the bio-cultural and climate integrity of the Amazon rainforest by advancing indigenous peoples' rights, territories, and solutions. For 20+ years Leila has worked to defend the world's rainforests, human rights, and the climate through grassroots organizing and international advocacy campaigns at Amazon Watch, Rainforest Action Network, Global Exchange, and Green Corps. She is a 1998 graduate of the University of California at Santa Barbara. Leila lives in San Francisco, CA with her husband and two young daughters.

Peter Coyote (Honorary Board Member)

Brazil, Ecuador, Peru, Colombia

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