Groups Release Call to Action for North American Forest & Climate Movement Radical transformation needed to change the economic and political systems

Please join Indigenous Environmental Network, Global Justice Ecology Project and Shawnee Forest Defense! in October for The Resurgence: 2019 Forest & Climate Movement Convergence where we will join together diverse movements to build strategies with action to fundamentally transform the system that is destroying life on Earth.

For Immediate Media Release May 29, 2019

Contact: Steve Taylor, +1.314.210.1322 steve@globaljusticeecology.org

Groups Release Call to Action for North American Forest & Climate Movement

Radical transformation needed to change the economic and political systems

Carbondale, IL—The Indigenous Environmental Network, Global Justice Ecology Project and Shawnee Forest Defense! today announced The Resurgence: 2019 North American Forest & Climate Movement Convergence, to bring together activists, groups, Indigenous peoples, communities and others to create strategies to address the climate and biodiversity crisis. It will be held in the Shawnee National Forest in southern Illinois from October 11 through October 14 – culminating on Indigenous Peoples’ Day.

From the Convergence Coordinating Committee Call to Action:

We will bring together our diverse experiences and backgrounds to build a radical movement that unifies efforts to protect forests and land with those dedicated to social, environmental and climate justice to create a resurgence powerful enough to achieve the systemic change we need to survive.

Forests, communities and the Earth are under attack. Governments, corporations and elites in North America are collaborating with others to consolidate power, profit and control on a global scale. Their actions are driving climate change and destruction of forests, causing mass-extinction of species, devastating communities, and threatening whole peoples and the entire biosphere.

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently stated that life on Earth is in extreme danger if we do not achieve rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society by 2030. To avoid the worst impacts from climate change, we must immediately cease burning fossil fuels and drastically reduce over-consumption. We must protect and restore the Earth's forest ecosystems, and defend territorial rights of Indigenous and forest dependent communities whose lands most of the world’s remaining intact forests are found.

Forests are intricately intertwined webs of life. The more intact and diverse forests are, the better they can withstand stresses like climate change. Forests will be the model for our organizing. The more diverse our movements, the more interconnected, and the more focused on the roots, the stronger and more resilient we will be to withstand the stresses of the massive effort we undertake.

The Resurgence: 2019 North American Forest & Climate Movement Convergence will take place just above the convergence of the great Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, in the forested Shawnee Hills, next to the steep topography of the Illinois Ozarks and the southern swamps of the Coastal Plain. It is the traditional lands of the Indigenous Shawnee, Kaskaskia and Chickasaw Peoples. We remember all who lost their lives during the Trail of Tears and are buried in and around the region.

It has never been more critical to build a broad, united movement that can resist the wholesale war against the Earth.

For more information, including registration and Strategic Action Sessions please see: forestclimateconvergence.org

Available for Interview:

Brenda Jo McManama, Indigenous Environmental Network; Anne Petermann, Global Justice Ecology Project; Tabitha Tripp and John Wallace, Shawnee Forest Defense!

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The Indigenous Environmental Network is an alliance of Indigenous Peoples whose Shared Mission is to Protect the Sacredness of Earth Mother from contamination & exploitation by Respecting and Adhering to Indigenous Knowledge and Natural Law

ienearth.org saveourroots.org

Global Justice Ecology Project’s mission is to build local, national and international alliances with action to address the intertwined root causes of social injustice, economic domination and environmental destruction.

globaljusticeecology.org stopgetrees.org

Shawnee Forest Defense! is a citizen community group protecting the Shawnee National Forest, a loved place rich in activist history.

shawneeforestdefense.org ProtectSNF@gmail.com