Conference in Berlin: defending the rainforest and amplifying Indigenous voices

Rainforests hold extraordinary ecological and cultural wealth. They are home to Indigenous people and local communities whose cultures and knowledge are inseparable from the forests they defend. Yet their ancestral lands are being cleared for palm oil, animal feed, raw materials, and paper.

On September 13, 2026, rainforest defenders, researchers, and Rainforest Rescue partners from three continents will gather in Berlin to share firsthand accounts of what is at stake and what resistance looks like on the ground.

The program:

2:00 – 4:00 p.m.: Rainforest meet-up – firsthand information and experiences

Step into our World Café in the atrium with Rainforest Rescue partners from three continents. Meet Indigenous representatives, activists, and researchers working to protect forests, defend land rights, and resist deforestation in the Amazon, the Congo Basin, and Southeast Asia. Talk directly with activists and researchers about protecting bonobos, orangutans, and chimpanzees, and about 40 years of Rainforest Rescue’s work with partner organizations.

• With Auriga Nusantara and Pusaka from Indonesia, Mother Nature Cambodia, Bonobo Alive from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation from Liberia, researchers from Phyllodrom e.V. – Museum and Institute for Rainforest Ecology, and Rainforest Rescue teams from Brazil, Germany, and Switzerland
• Hands-on activities for young people

2:30 – 3:00 p.m.: Mother Nature Cambodia: young activists putting their freedom on the line for nature and human rights

In the screening room, Lisa Mean of Mother Nature Cambodia, recipient of the 2023 Right Livelihood Award, will show a video about the young group’s fearless and creative actions against environmental destruction.

3:00 – 4:00 p.m.: The Amazon: human rights and traditional peoples and communities

Our partners from the Brazilian state of Maranhão will share firsthand accounts of their work on agroecology and resistance to land grabbing and aerial pesticide spraying.

• With the Maranhão Agroecology Network (Rama), the Association for Health Education and Agriculture (ACESA), the Maranhão Pastoral Land Commission (CPT MA), the Quilombola Movement of Maranhão (MOQUIBOM), the National Campaign in Defense of the Cerrado, and Rainforest Rescue Brazil

4:00 – 5:00 p.m.: Impressions – images, culture, sounds, and messages from the rainforest

With Colombian-Venezuelan musician Sol Okarina.

5:00 – 7:00 p.m.: Voices from the Rainforest – learning from Indigenous knowledge and practices – panel discussion

Indigenous knowledge comes from generations of living with, caring for, and defending rainforest territories. Activists and rainforest defenders from the Amazon, the Congo Basin, Nigeria, and Southeast Asia will speak about human rights, resistance, and the struggles facing their communities.

Moderated by environmental journalist and author Kathrin Hartmann.

• Participants are Marli Borges of the Quilombola Movement from Brazil, Timer Manurung of Auriga Nusantara and a representative of Pusaka from Indonesia, Odey Oyama of the Rainforest Resource and Development Centre from Nigeria, Lisa Mean of Mother Nature Cambodia, as well as Felipe Duran and Marianne Klute of Rainforest Rescue.

The discussion will be held in English, with simultaneous interpretation into Portuguese and German.

The discussion will be livestreamed on YouTube.