I orea te tuatara ka patu ki waho (a problem is solved by resolutely finding solutions).

The international board of the Aotearoa-based Hillary Institute has chosen Vanessa Nakate as its 2022 Hillary Laureate for exceptional leadership in Climate Action.

Vanessa Nakate is a climate activist and author from Uganda and founder of the Africa-based Rise Up Movement. She began striking for the climate in her home town of Kampala in January 2019 after witnessing droughts and flooding devastating communities in Uganda. She now campaigns internationally to highlight climate change impacts already playing out in Africa and the larger global north-south ‘Loss and Damage’ challenge. This has seen her powerfully engaging audiences from COP26 at Glasgow, to the World Economic Forum at Davos, to meeting with His Holiness Pope Francis. Vanessa has been named one of TIME magazine's 100 emerging global leaders and one of the Financial Times' 25 Most Influential Women of 2021.

Vanessa is the 11th Global Laureate and joins an illustrious line-up of ten annual Hillary Laureates to receive this prestigious global award since the inaugural Laureate, carbon tracker, rewilder and author Jeremy Leggett (UK) in 2009. They include renowned Swedish Climate Scientist, Johan Röckstrom; the founder of Amazon Watch, Atossa Soltani; former President of Kiribati, Anote Tong, and Nakate’s immediate predecessor, Christiana Figueres (Costa Rica), the architect of the 2015 Paris Climate Accord.

“The leadership already being demonstrated by Vanessa in her mid-20s is a remarkable tribute to her myriad of gifts and passionate commitment to Climate action, and to the African continent’s demand for equitable change, where her work is firmly based. She is rapidly becoming a global figure of very significant impact and a unique voice at this critical time,” says Institute Founder Mark Prain.

“Vanessa is joining a very special community/whanau/family of remarkable global leaders focussed on climate justice and solutions modelling founded in the core humanity and values of our namesake Sir Edmund Hillary. The Hillary Institute and our wider Edmund Hillary Fellowship are delighted to have her join us on this journey, ” says Chair Anna Kominik.

"The climate crisis is the greatest threat that humanity faces - but it is also a brutal reality that people in Africa are facing right now in the form of drought, flooding, cyclones and landslides. I’m honoured to be named the 2022 Hillary Laureate and to have the support of The Hillary Institute in my efforts to tell the stories of the communities most affected by the climate crisis, and to urge leaders from the global north to initiate a facility for Loss and Damage finance at COP27,” says Vanessa Nakate.

The institute will work alongside Vanessa over the next year, encouraging her to do more of the remarkable work she is already doing. Support from her fellow Laureates globally will be further augmented by the involvement of the Edmund Hillary Fellowship (EHF), made up of more than 500 technologists, creatives, investors, entrepreneurs, educators and systems designers, from 57 nationalities, all committed to New Zealand as a base camp for global impact.

The Hillary Institute and Edmund Hillary Fellowship congratulates Vanessa on becoming the 2022 Hillary Laureate and we look forward to welcoming her to Aotearoa during 2022/23.

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