23/03/2026
Just Transition or Green Colonialism? Impacts of the Green Transition on Indigenous Land and Human Rights
📅 30 March 2026
🕒 11:30 – 13:30
📍 Porthania, Room 545, University of Helsinki (Yliopistonkatu 3)
REGISTER your participation via this form! https://elomake.helsinki.fi/lomakkeet/139685/lomake.html
This mini-seminar seeks to discuss the impacts of the ’green transition’ — particularly renewable energy and mineral extraction projects — on the human rights and land rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Projects carried out in the name of ’climate action’ often create new pressures on communities whose livelihoods and cultures are deeply tied to their lands. The seminar will explore whether such developments represent a truly just transition, or risk becoming forms of green colonialism.
The discussion will highlight:
Pastoralist communities in Turkana and Marsabit regions in Kenya
The Sámi Indigenous people across Finland, Norway and Sweden
A central question guiding the seminar is:
How are communities empowering themselves to decide what happens on their ancestral lands?
Speakers
Ekaale Epakan – Human Rights Defender, Kenya
Purity Gakuo – IMPACT Kenya (online)
Elina Mikola – Amnesty International Finland
Darina Petrova – Postdoctoral Researcher, New York University
Sámi representative (tbc)
Moderator:
Dorothée Cambou – Assistant Professor, Principal Investigator of Just Transition REBOUND – STN Project, University of Helsinki
Organisers
Helsinki Institute of Sustainability Science (HELSUS), KIOS Foundation, Siemenpuu Foundation and Amnesty International - Suomen osasto (Finnish section)