The fossil fuel industry has polluted our art, and now it’s polluting our information. So, we clearly say: stop the lies. —Brazilian political scientist Rayana Burgos
Climate misinformation experts Rayana Burgos (right) and Pierre Cannet (left) at COP30. Credit: Tanka Dhakal/IPS
BELÉM, Brazil, Nov 12 2025 (IPS) – Concerned scientists at the UN climate conference in Belém are appealing for collective action to combat climate change-related misinformation and disinformation.
The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) sounded the alarm over the widespread dissemination of climate disinformation across multiple fronts, including social media and traditional media platforms, warning that it impacts public health, undermines democracy, and weakens the effectiveness of climate policies.
“Disinformation is everywhere. It’s sophisticated. It’s evolving rapidly,” said J. Timmons Roberts, Professor of Environmental Studies and Sociology at Brown University. “Structural power deploys disinformation to preserve the status quo. The fossil fuel industry spends about 10 times as much as the environmental and renewable energy sectors combined.”
Experts at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) climate information integrity press conference at COP30. Credit: Tanka Dhakal/IPS
Roberts, the Executive Director of the Climate Social Science Network, emphasized the need to understand the tactics, key actors, and the flow of power, money, and information to tackle climate disinformation.
“There’s a series of tactics that offer effective solutions to this disinformation—for example, appealing to conservative identities, to the identities of the people you’re speaking to, and using debunking and pre-bunking strategies,” he said. “You have to have the right messengers.”
In an open letter, a global coalition of scientists, civil society groups, Indigenous Peoples, and faith leaders called on policymakers to take immediate action to combat climate misinformation and uphold information integrity. They emphasized that both the UN and the World Economic Forum have identified climate change and disinformation as among the greatest threats to humanity.
“Governments need to see this [climate disinformation] as a kind of public safety issue,” said Ben Backwell, CEO of the Global Wind Energy Council. “This is not freedom of speech. This is the control of libraries and communications by very confident people.”
He stressed the importance of democratizing media and increasing independent journalism to counter a media ecosystem dominated by a wealthy few.
At a press conference on Tuesday—designated as the official thematic day on information integrity—experts warned that climate misinformation causes real-time harm and that major platforms, including Meta, X, and TikTok, are actively spreading misinformation, disinformation, or false information.
“Disinformation and misinformation are their business model,” said Pierre Cannet, Global Head of Public Affairs and Policy at ClientEarth. “This is why we are calling on countries to join this effort for information integrity—not just at the conference, but also back home—and to enforce laws that address misinformation and disinformation.”
Experts emphasized that collaboration across all levels of society is essential to overcoming coordinated misinformation campaigns, which are often driven by profit motives, particularly from the fossil fuel industry.
Rayana Burgos, a Brazilian political scientist at the Network of Terreiro Communities for the Environment, stated that without truth, there can be no climate justice or final action.
“The fossil fuel industry has polluted our art, and now it’s polluting our information. So, we clearly say: stop the lies, stop the delay,” she added. “We need to act together. Access to information is a human right.”
This feature is published with the support of Open Society Foundations.
A new report, ‘Indigenous Territories and Local Communities on the Frontlines,’ calls for secure land rights, free and informed consent, direct financing to communities, protection of life, and recognition of traditional knowledge.
Brazil’s Minister of Indigenous Peoples, Sonia Guajajara, attends a meeting during the UN Climate Change Conference COP 30. Credit: Hermes Caruzo/COP30
SRINAGAR, India & BELÉM, Brazil, Nov 8 2025 (IPS) – A report by the Global Alliance of Territorial Communities (GATC) and Earth Insight paints a stark picture of how extractive industries, deforestation, and climate change are converging to endanger the world’s last intact tropical forests and the Indigenous Peoples who protect them.
The report, ‘Indigenous Territories and Local Communities on the Frontlines,’ combines geospatial analysis and community data to show that nearly one billion hectares of forests are under Indigenous stewardship, yet face growing industrial threats that could upend global climate and biodiversity goals.
Despite representing less than five percent of the world’s population, Indigenous Peoples and local communities (IPs and LCs) safeguard more than half of all remaining intact forests and 43 percent of global biodiversity hotspots.
These territories store vast amounts of carbon, regulate ecosystems, and preserve cultures and languages that have sustained humanity’s relationship with nature for millennia. But the report warns that governments and corporations are undermining this stewardship through unrestrained extraction of resources in the name of economic growth or even “green transition.”
One of the main report authors, Florencia Librizzi, who is also a Deputy Director at Earth Insight, told IPS that the perspectives and stories from each region are grounded in the lived realities of Indigenous Peoples and local communities and come directly from the organizations from each of the regions that the report focuses on in Mesoamerica, Amazonia, the Congo Basin, and Indonesia.
Across four critical regions—the Amazon, Congo Basin, Indonesia, and Mesoamerica—extractive industries overlap with millions of hectares of ancestral land. In the Amazon, oil and gas blocks cover 31 million hectares of Indigenous territories, while mining concessions sprawl across another 9.8 million.
In the Congo Basin, 38 percent of community forests are under oil and gas threat, endangering peatlands that store immense quantities of carbon. Indonesia’s Indigenous territories face 18 percent overlap with timber concessions, while in Mesoamerica, 19 million hectares—17 percent of Indigenous land—are claimed for mining, alongside rampant narcotrafficking and colonization.
These intrusions have turned Indigenous territories into sacrifice zones. From nickel extraction in Indonesia to oil drilling in Ecuador and illegal logging in the Democratic Republic of Congo, corporate incursions threaten lives, livelihoods, and ecosystems. Between 2012 and 2024, 1,692 environmental defenders were killed or disappeared across GATC countries, with 208 deaths linked to extractive industries and 131 to logging. The report calls this violence “the paradox of protection”—the act of defending nature now puts those defenders at deadly risk.
Yet the report also documents extraordinary resilience. In Guatemala’s Maya Biosphere Reserve, Indigenous forest communities have achieved near-zero deforestation—only 1.5 percent forest loss between 2014 and 2024, compared to 11 percent in adjacent areas. In Colombia, Indigenous Territorial Entities maintain over 99 percent of their forests intact.
The O’Hongana Manyawa of Indonesia continue to defend their lands against nickel mining, while the Guna people of Panama manage autonomous governance systems that integrate culture, tourism, and ecology.
In the Congo, the 2022 “Pygmy Law” has begun recognizing community rights to forest governance, a historic step toward justice.
The report’s findings were released ahead of the 30th UN Climate Conference (COP30), emphasizing the urgency of aligning international climate and biodiversity frameworks with Indigenous rights.
The 2025 Brazzaville Declaration, adopted at the First Global Congress of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities from the Forest Basins, provides a roadmap for such alignment.
Signed by leaders from 24 countries representing 35 million people, it calls for five key commitments: secure land rights, free and informed consent, direct financing to communities, protection of life, and recognition of traditional knowledge.
These “Five Demands” are the cornerstone of what the GATC calls a shift “from extraction to regeneration.”
They demand an end to the violence and criminalization of Indigenous leaders and insist that global climate finance reach local hands.
The report notes that, despite the 2021 COP26 pledge of 1.7 billion dollars for forest protection, only 7.6 percent of that money reached Indigenous communities directly.
“Without financing that strengthens territorial governance, all global commitments will remain symbolic,” said the GATC in a joint statement.
Reacting to the announcement of the The Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) announced on the first day of the COP Leaders’ Summit and touted as a “new and innovative financing mechanism” that would see forest countries paid every single year in perpetuity for keeping forests standing, Juan Carlos Jintiach, Executive Secretary of the Global Alliance of Territorial Communities (GATC) said, “Even if the TFFF does not reach all its fundraising goals, the message it conveys is already powerful: climate and forest finance cannot happen without us Indigenous Peoples and local leadership at its core.
“This COP offers a crucial opportunity to amplify that message, especially as it takes place in the heart of the Amazon. We hope the focus remains on the communities who live there, those of us who have protected the forests for generations. What we need most from this COP is political will to guarantee our rights, to be recognized as partners rather than beneficiaries, to ensure transparency and justice in climate finance, and to channel resources directly to those defending the land, despite growing risks and violence.”
Deforestation in Acre State, Brazil. Credit: Victor Moriyama / Climate Visuals
Jintiach, who is also the report’s author, told IPS the Global Alliance has proposed establishing clear mechanisms to ensure that climate finance reaches Indigenous Peoples’ and local communities’ initiatives directly, not through layers of external actors.
“That’s why we have established our Shandia Platform, a global Indigenous-led mechanism designed to channel direct, predictable, and effective climate finance to our territories. Through the Shandia Funds Network, we ensure that funding is managed according to our priorities, governance systems, and traditional knowledge. The platform also includes a transparent system to track and monitor funding flows, with a specific indicator for direct finance to Indigenous Peoples and local communities,” he said.
The report also warns that global conservation goals such as the “30×30” biodiversity target—protecting 30 percent of Earth’s land and sea by 2030—cannot succeed without Indigenous participation. Policies under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework and the Paris Agreement must, it says, embed Indigenous governance and knowledge at their core. Otherwise, climate strategies risk reinforcing historical injustices by excluding those who have sustained these ecosystems for centuries.
Jintiach said that based on his experience at GATC, Indigenous Peoples’ and local communities’-led conservation models are not only vital but also deeply effective.
“In our territories, it is our peoples and communities who are conserving both nature and culture, protecting the forests, waters, and biodiversity that sustain all of us,” he said.
He added, “Multiple studies confirm what we already know from experience: Indigenous and local community lands have lower rates of deforestation and higher biodiversity than those managed under state or private models. Our success is rooted in ancestral knowledge, collective governance, and a deep spiritual connection to the land, principles that ensure true, lasting conservation.”
According to Jintiach, the GATC 5 demands and the Brazzaville Declaration are critical global reference points and we are encouraged by the level of interest and engagement displayed by political leaders in the lead-up to COP 30.
Map highlighting extractive threats faced by Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities across the Amazon basin. Credit: GATC
“We are hopeful that these principles will be uplifted and championed at COP 30, the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, CBD COP 17 and on the long road ahead,” he said.
When asked about the rising violence against environmental defenders, Jintiach said that the Brazzaville Declaration calls for a global convention to protect Environmental Human Rights Defenders, including Indigenous Peoples and local community leaders.
According to him, the governments must urgently tackle the corruption and impunity fueling threats and violence while supporting collective protection and preventing rollback of rights.
“This also means upholding and strengthening the Escazú Agreement and UNDRIP, and ensuring long-term protection through Indigenous Peoples and local communities-led governance, secure land tenure, and accountability for human rights violations.”
Earth Insight’s Executive Director Tyson Miller described the collaboration as a call to action rather than another policy document. “Without urgent recognition of territorial rights, respect for consent, and protection of ecosystems, global climate and biodiversity goals cannot be achieved,” he said. “This report is both a warning and an invitation—to act with courage and stand in solidarity.”
The case studies highlight how Indigenous governance models already offer proven solutions to the climate crisis. In the Brazilian Amazon, Indigenous organizations have proposed a self-determined Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) to reduce emissions through territorial protection. Their slogan, “Demarcation is Mitigation,” underlines how securing Indigenous land rights directly supports the Paris Agreement’s goals. Similarly, in Central Africa, communities have pioneered decolonized conservation approaches that integrate Indigenous leadership into national park management, reversing exclusionary models imposed since colonial times.
In Mesoamerica, the Muskitia region—known as “Little Amazon”—illustrates both crisis and hope. It faces deforestation from drug trafficking and illegal logging, yet community-based reforestation and forest monitoring are restoring ecosystems and livelihoods. Women and youth play leading roles in governance, showing how inclusive leadership strengthens resilience.
The report’s conclusion is unequivocal: where Indigenous rights are recognized, ecosystems thrive; where they are ignored, destruction follows. It argues that the fight for land is inseparable from the fight against climate change. Indigenous territories are not just sources of raw materials; they are “living systems of governance, culture, and biodiversity” essential to humanity’s survival.
The Brazzaville Declaration urges governments to ratify international human rights conventions, end deforestation by 2030, and integrate Indigenous territories into national biodiversity and climate plans. It also calls for a global convention to protect environmental human rights defenders, whose safety is central to planetary stability.
For GATC’s leaders, the message is deeply personal. “Our traditional knowledge is the language of Mother Earth,” said Joseph Itongwa, GATC Co-Chair from the Congo Basin. “We cannot protect the planet if our territories, our identity, and our livelihoods remain under threat.”
This feature is published with the support of Open Society Foundations.
Secretary General of CIVICUS, Mandeep Tiwana, at International Civil Society Week 2025. Credit: Civicus
BANGKOK, Nov 1 2025 (IPS) – It is a bleak global moment—with civil society actors battling assassinations, imprisonment, fabricated charges, and funding cuts to pro-democracy movements in a world gripped by inequality, climate chaos, and rising authoritarianism. Yet, the mood at Bangkok’s Thammasat University was anything but defeated.
Once the site of the 1976 massacre, where pro-democracy students were brutally crushed, the campus—a “hallowed ground” for civil society actors—echoed with renewed voices calling for defending democracy in what Secretary General of CIVICUS, Mandeep Tiwana, described as a “topsy-turvy world” with rising authoritarianism—a poignant reminder that even in places scarred by repression, the struggle for civic space endures.
“Let it resonate,” said Ichal Supriadi, Secretary General, Asian Democracy Network. “Democracy must be defended together,” adding that it was the “shared strength” that confronts authoritarianism.
Citing alarming figures, he spoke bluntly of the global imbalance in priorities—noting how military expenditure continues to soar even as civic space shrinks. He pointedly referred to the United States’ Ministry of Defense as the “Ministry of War,” comparing its USD 968 billion military budget with China’s USD 3 billion and noting that spending on the war in Ukraine had increased tenfold in just three years—a stark illustration of global priorities. “This is where we are with respect to peace and war,” he said gloomily.
Ichal Supriadi, Secretary General, Asian Democracy Network. Credit: Civicus
At another session, similar reflections set the tone for a broader critique of global power dynamics. Walden Bello, a former senator and peace activist from the Philippines, argued that the United States—especially under the Trump administration—had abandoned even the pretense of a free-market system, replacing it with what he called “overt monopolistic hegemony.” American imperialism, he said, “graduated away from camouflage attempts and is now unapologetic in demanding that the world bend to its wishes.”
Dr. Gothom Arya of the Asian Cultural Forum on Development and the Peace and Culture Foundation. Credit: Civicus
Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy, a Pakistani physicist and author, echoed the sentiment, expressing outrage at his own country’s leadership. He condemned Pakistan’s decision to nominate a “psychopath, habitual liar, and aggressive warmonger” for the Nobel Peace Prize, saying that the leadership had “no right to barter away minerals and rare earth materials to an American dictator” without public consent.
Hoodbhoy urged the international community to intervene and restart peace talks between Pakistan and India—two nuclear-armed neighbors perpetually teetering on the edge of renewed conflict.
But at no point during the day did the focus shift away from the ongoing humanitarian crises. Arya reminded the audience of the tragic loss of civilian lives in Gaza, the devastating fighting in Sudan that had led to widespread malnutrition, and the global inequality worsened by climate inaction. “Because some big countries refused to follow the Paris Agreement ten years ago,” he warned, “the rest of the world will suffer the consequences.”
That grim reality was brought into even sharper relief by Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi, a Palestinian physician and politician, who delivered a harrowing account of Gaza’s devastation. He said that through the use of American-supplied weapons, Israel had killed an estimated 12 percent of Gaza’s population, destroyed every hospital and university, and left nearly 10,000 bodies buried beneath the rubble.
“Even as these crises unfolded across the world, the conference demonstrated that civil society continues to persevere, as nearly 1,000 people from more than 75 organizations overcame travel bans and visa hurdles to gather at Thammasat University, sharing strategies, solidarity, and hope through over 120 sessions.
Among them was a delegation whose presence carried the weight of an entire nation’s silenced hopes—Hamrah, believed to be the only Afghan civil society group at ICSW.
“Our participation is important at a time when much of the world has turned its gaze away from Afghanistan,” Timor Sharan, co-founder and programme director of the HAMRAH Initiative, told IPS.
“It is vital to remind the global community that Afghan civil society has not disappeared; it’s fighting and holding the line.”
Through networks like HAMRAH, he said, activists, educators, and defenders have continued secret and online schools, documented abuses, and amplified those silenced under the Taliban rule. “Our presence here is both a statement of resilience and a call for solidarity.”
“Visibility matters,” pointed out Riska Carolina, an Indonesian woman and LGBTIQ+ rights advocate working with ASEAN SOGIE Caucus (ASC). “What’s even more powerful is being visible together.”
“It was special because it brought together movements—Dalit, Indigenous, feminist, disability, and queer—that rarely share the same space, creating room for intersectional democracy to take shape,” said Carolina, whose work focuses on regional advocacy for LGBTQIA+ rights within Southeast Asia’s political and human rights frameworks, especially the ASEAN system, which she said has historically been “slow to recognize issues of sexuality and gender diversity.”
“We work to make sure that SOGIESC (Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Expression, and Sex Characteristics) inclusion is not just seen as a niche issue, but as a core part of democracy, governance, and human rights. That means engaging governments, civil society, and regional bodies to ensure queer people’s participation, safety, and dignity is part of how we measure democratic progress.”
She said the ICSW provided ASC with a chance to make “visible” the connection between civic space, democracy, and queer liberation and to remind people that democracy is not only about elections but also about “who is able to live freely and who remains silenced by law or stigma.”
Away from the main sessions, civil society leaders gathered for a candid huddle—part reflection, part reckoning—to examine their role in an era when their space to act was shrinking.
“The dialogue surfaced some tough but necessary questions,” he said. They asked themselves: ‘Have we grasped the full scale of the challenges we face?’ ‘Are our responses strong enough?’ ‘Are we expecting anti-rights forces to respect our rules and values?’ ‘Are we reacting instead of setting the agenda? And are we allies—or accomplices—of those risking everything for justice?’
But if there was one thing crystal clear to everyone present, it was that civil society must stand united, not fragmented, to defend democracy.
Mandeep Tiwana, Secretary General, CIVICUS Global Alliance. Credit: CIVICUS
BULAWAYO & BANGKOK, Oct 31 2025 (IPS) – From the streets of Bangkok to power corridors in Washington, the civil society space for dissent is fast shrinking. Authoritarian regimes are silencing opposition but indirectly fueling corruption and widening inequality, according to a leading global civil society alliance.
The warning is from Mandeep Tiwana, Secretary General of CIVICUS Global Alliance, who points to a troubling trend: civil society is increasingly considered a threat to those in power.
That is a sobering assessment from CIVICUS, which reports that a wave of repression by authoritarian regimes is directly fueling corruption and exploding inequality.
“The quality of democracy on hand around the world is very poor at the moment,” Tiwana tells IPS in an exclusive interview. “That is why civil society organizations are seen as a threat by authoritative leaders and the negative impact of attacking civil society means there is a rise in corruption, there is less inclusion, there is less transparency in public life and more inequality in society.”
His comments come ahead of the 16th International Civil Society Week (ICSW) from 1–5 November 2025 convened by CIVICUS and the Asia Democracy Network. The ICSW will bring together more than 1,300 delegates comprising activists, civil society groups, academics, and human rights advocates to empower citizen action and build powerful alliances. ICSW pays tribute to activists, movements, and civil society achieving significant progress, defending civic freedoms, and showing remarkable resilience despite the many challenges.
The ICSW takes place against a bleak backdrop. According to the CIVICUS Monitor, a research partnership between CIVICUS and over 20 organizations tracking civic freedoms, civil society is under attack in 116 of 198 countries and territories. The fundamental freedoms of expression, association, and peaceful assembly face significant deterrents worldwide.
Protests at COP27 in Egypt. Mandeep Tiwana, Secretary General of CIVICUS Global Alliance, is hopeful that COP30, in Belém, Brazil, will be more inclusive. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS
“It is becoming increasingly dangerous to be a civil society activist and to be the leader of a civil society organization,” Tiwana tells IPS. “Many organizations have been defunded because governments don’t like what they do to ensure transparency or because they speak out against some very powerful people. It is a challenging environment for civil society.”
Research by CIVICUS categorizes civic freedom in five dimensions: open, narrowed, obstructed, repressed, and closed. Alarmingly, over 70 percent of the world’s population now lives in countries rated in the two worst categories: ‘repressed’ and ‘closed.’
“This marks a regression in democratic values, rights, and accountability,” Tiwana noted, adding that even in the remaining 30% of nations, restrictions on civic freedoms remain.
Repression Tools in Tow
The ICSW, being held under the theme ‘Celebrating citizen action: reimagining democracy, rights, and inclusion for today’s world,’ convenes against this backdrop.
Multifaceted tools are used by governments to stifle dissent. Governments are introducing laws to block civil society organizations from receiving international funding while simultaneously restricting domestic resources. Besides, laws have also been enacted in some countries to restrict the independence of civil society organizations that scrutinize governments and promote transparency.
For civil society activists, the consequences are sobering.
“If you speak truth to power, uncover high-level corruption and try to seek transformative change in society, whether it’s on gender equality or inclusion of minorities you can be subjected to severe forms of persecution,” Tiwana explained. “This includes stigmatization, intimidation, imprisonment for long periods, physical attacks, and death.”
Multilateralism Tumbles, Unilateralism Rises
Tiwana said there is an increasing breakdown in multilateralism and respect for international laws from which civil society draws its rights.
This erosion of civic space is reflected in the breakdown of the international system. Tiwana identified a surge in unilateralism and a disregard for the international laws that have historically safeguarded the rights of civil society.
“If you look at what’s happening around the world, whether with regard to conflicts in Palestine, in the Congo, in Sudan, in Myanmar, in Ukraine, in Cameroon, and elsewhere, governments are not respecting international norms,” he observed, remarking that authoritarian regimes were abusing the sovereignty of other countries, ignoring the Geneva conventions, and legalizing attacks on civilians, torturing and persecuting civilians.
This collapse of multilateralism has enabled a form of transactional diplomacy, where narrowly defined national interests trump human rights. Powerful states now collude to manipulate public policy, enhancing their wealth and power. When civil society attempts to expose these corrupt relationships, it becomes a target.
“They are colluding to game public policy to suit their interests and to enhance their wealth. The offshoot of this is that civil society is attacked when it tries to expose these corrupt relationships,” said Tiwana, expressing concern about the rise in state capture by oligarchs who now own vast swathes of the media and technology landscapes.
Citing countries like China and Rwanda, which, while they have different ways of functioning, Tiwana said both are powerful authoritarian states engaging in transactional diplomacy and are opposed to the civil society’s power to hold them to account.
The election of Donald Trump as US President in 2025 has shattered the foundation of the US as a democracy, Tiwana noted. The country no longer supports democratic values internationally and is at home with attacks on the media and defunding of civil society.
The action by the US has negative impacts, as some leaders around the world are taking their cue from Trump in muzzling civil society and media freedoms, he said, pointing to how the US has created common cause with authoritarian governments in El Salvador, Israel, Argentina, and Hungary.
The fight Goes On
Despite facing repression and threats, civil society continues to resist authoritarian regimes. From massive street protests against corruption in Nepal, and Guatemala to pro-democracy movements that have removed governments in Bangladesh and Madagascar,
“People need to have courage to stand up for what they believe and to speak out when their neighbors are persecuted,” Tiwana told IPS. “People still need to continue to speak the truth and come out in the streets in peaceful protest against the injustice that is happening. They should not lose hope.”
On the curtailing of civil society participation in climate change negotiations, Tiwana said the upcoming COP30 in Brazil offered hope. The host government believes in democratic values and including civil society at the table.
“Past COPs have been held in petro states—Azerbaijan, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt—which are all authoritarian states where civil society has been attacked, crushed, and persecuted,” he said. “We are hopeful that there will be greater inclusion of voices and the commitments that will be made to reduce emissions will be ambitious but the question is really going to be after the COP and if those commitments will be from governments that really don’t care about civil society demands or about the well-being of their people.”
Young people, Tiwana said, have shown the way. Movements like Fridays for Future and the Black Lives Matter have demonstrated the power of solidarity and unified action.
But, given the massive protests, has this resistance led to change of a similar scale?
“Unfortunately, we are seeing a rise in military dictatorships around the world,” Tiwana admitted, attributing this to a fraying appetite by the international community to uphold human rights and democratic values.
“Conflict, environmental degradation, extreme wealth accumulation, and high-level corruption are interlinked because it’s people who want to possess more than they need.”
Tiwana illustrated what he means by global priorities.
“We have USD 2.7 trillion in military spending year-on-year nowadays, whereas 700 million people go to bed hungry every night.”
“As civil society, we are trying to expose these corrupt relationships that exist. So the fight for equality, the struggle to create better, more peaceful, more just societies—something CIVICUS supports very much—are some of the conversations that we will be looking to have at the International Civil Society Week.”
The community gets together to repair a school in the city of Saraqib, located south of Idlib, that was destroyed by bombing during the Assad regime. Credit: Sonia Al Ali/IPS
IDLIB, Syria, Oct 16 2025 (IPS) – The war has deprived thousands of Syrian children of their right to education, especially displaced children in makeshift camps. Amidst difficult economic conditions and the inability of many families to afford educational costs, the future of these children is under threat.
Adel Al-Abbas, a 13-year-old boy from Aleppo, northern Syria, was forced to quit his education after being displaced from his city and moving to a camp on the Syrian-Turkish border. He says, “I was chasing my dream like any other child, but my family’s poverty and the harsh circumstances stood in my way and destroyed all my dreams.”
Adel had hoped to become an engineer, but he left school and gave up on his goal. He replaced books and pens with work tools to help his impoverished family secure life’s necessities. He adds, “We are living in extremely difficult conditions today; we can’t even afford food. So, I have to find a job to survive and help my family, especially after my father was hit by shrapnel in the head, which caused him a permanent disability.”
Adel’s mother is saddened by her son’s situation, saying to IPS, “We need the income my son brings in after my husband got sick and became unable to provide for our family. In any case, work is better than an education that is now useless after he’s been out of school for so long and has fallen behind his peers.”
Reem Al-Diri, an 11-year-old, left school after her family was displaced from rural Damascus to the city of Idlib in northern Syria. Explaining why, she speaks with a clear sense of regret: “I loved school very much and was one of the top students in my class, but my family decided I had to stop my education to help my mom with the housework.”
The young girl confirms that she watches children on their way to school every morning, and she wishes she could go with them to complete her education and become a teacher in the future.
Reem’s mother, Umayya Al-Khalid, justifies her daughter’s absence from school, saying, “After we moved to a camp on the outskirts of Idlib, the schools became far from where we live. We also suffer from a lack of security and the widespread kidnapping of girls. So, I feared for my daughter and preferred for her to stay at home.”
Causes of school dropout
Akram Al-Hussein, a school principal in Idlib, northern Syria, speaks about the school dropout crisis in the country.
“School dropouts are one of the most serious challenges facing society. The absence of education leads to an unknown future for children and for the entire community.”
Al-Hussein emphasizes that relevant authorities and the international community must exert greater efforts to support education and ensure it does not remain a distant dream for children who face poverty and displacement.
He adds, “The reasons and motivations for children dropping out of school vary, ranging from conditions imposed by war—such as killings, displacement, and forced conscription-to child labor and poverty. Other factors include frequent displacement and the child’s inability to settle in one place during the school year, as well as a general lack of parental interest in education and their ignorance of the risks of depriving a child of schooling.”
In this context, the Syria Response Coordinators team, a specialized statistics group in Syria, noted in a statement that the number of out-of-school children in Syria has reached more than 2.5 million, with northwestern Syria alone accounting for over 318,000 out-of-school children, with more than 78,000 of them living in displacement camps. Of this group, 85 percent are engaged in various occupations, including dangerous ones.
In a report dated June 12, 2024, the team identified the key reasons behind the widening school dropout crisis.
A shortage of schools relative to the population density, a shift towards private education, difficult economic conditions, a lack of local government laws to prevent children from entering the labor market, displacement and forced migration, and a marginalized education sector with insufficient support from both local and international humanitarian organizations are seen as the causes.
The team’s report warned that if this trend continues, it will lead to the emergence of an uneducated, illiterate generation. This generation will be consumers rather than producers, and as a result, these uneducated children will become a burden on society.
Initiatives to Restore Destroyed Schools
The destruction of schools in Syria has significantly contributed to the school dropout crisis. Throughout the years of war, schools were not spared from destruction, looting, and vandalism, leaving millions of children without a place to learn or in buildings unfit for education. However, with the downfall of the Assad regime, several initiatives have been launched to restore these schools. This is seen as an urgent and immediate necessity for building a new Syria.
Samah Al-Dioub, a school principal in the northern Syrian city of Maarat al-Nu’man, says, “Syria’s schools suffered extensive damage from both the earthquake and the bombings. We have collected funds from the city’s residents and are now working on rehabilitating the school, but the need is still immense and the costs are very high, especially with residents returning to the city.” She explained that their current focus is on surveying schools and prioritizing which ones need renovation the most.
Engineer Mohammad Hannoun, director of school buildings at the Syrian Ministry of Education, states that approximately 7,400 schools across Syria were either partially or completely destroyed. They have restored 156 schools so far.
Hannoun adds, “We are working to rehabilitate schools in all Syrian regions, aiming to equip at least one school in every village or city to welcome returning students. The Ministry of Education, along with local and international organizations and civil society, are all contributing to these restoration efforts.”
Hannoun points out that the extensive damage to school buildings harms both teachers and students. It leads to a lack of basic educational resources, puts pressure on the few schools that are still functional, and causes a large number of students to drop out, which ultimately impacts the quality of the educational process.
As part of their contingency plans, Hannoun explains that the ministry, in collaboration with partner organizations, intends to activate schools with the available resources to accommodate children returning from camps and from asylum countries. This effort is particularly focused on affected areas that have experienced massive waves of displacement.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said in 2025, 16.7 million people, including 7.5 million children, are in need of humanitarian support in the country, with 2.45 million children out of school, and 2 million children are at risk of malnutrition.
The phenomenon of school dropouts has become a crisis threatening Syria’s children, who have been forced by circumstances to work to earn a living for their families. Instead of being in a classroom to build their futures, children are struggling to survive in an environment left behind by conflict and displacement.
Bapi Mondal and his wife Shanti in Bangalore. Climate change has forced the couple from their traditional livelihoods in the Sundarbans. Credit: Diwash Gahatraj/IPS
BANGALORE & PAKHIRALAY, India, Oct 15 2025 (IPS) – Bapi Mondal’s morning routine in Bangalore is a world away from his ancestral village, Pakhiralay, in the Sundarbans, West Bengal. He wakes before dawn, navigates heavy traffic, and spends eight long hours molding plastic battery casings. It’s not the life his honey-gathering forefathers knew, but factors like extreme storms, rising seas, and deadly soil salinity forced the 40-year-old to abandon centuries of family tradition and travel miles away to work in a concrete suburban factory.
Bapi still remembers his traditional skills—walking through a mangrove forest to find a tree with a honeycomb, mending boats and fishing nets, and singing and acting in the traditional plays. His 19-year-old son, Subhodeep—working alongside in the factory—has lost the heritage.
Bapi’s home, the Sundarbans—the world’s largest mangrove forest—is on the frontlines of climate change, and local livelihoods are taking the hit. In this watery maze where land and sea meet, villagers who once relied on fishing, honey collection and farming are now grappling with rising tides, saltier water, and more frequent storms. For many, life is becoming a struggle to hold on to centuries-old ways.
Sea levels in the Sundarbans are rising nearly twice the global rate, flooding villages and forcing families out. Saltwater ruins rice fields and ponds, making farming and fishing harder. Mawalis, the honey gatherers, also struggle as climate change disrupts flowering and damages mangroves, reducing wild bee populations.
A fisherman in the Sundarbans. Credit: Diwash Gahatraj/IPS
The crisis doesn’t end with the water. Salinity, once held at bay by freshwater flows, is climbing year after year, disrupting both fishing and farming. Pollution, ill-managed embankments, and overexploitation of resources add to the challenge. As incomes shrink and lands disappear, thousands leave for nearby cities, hoping for work but often finding only life in urban slums.
City life is unforgiving for migrants like Mondal. He spends eight grueling hours on his feet, molding battery casings six days a week in harsh factory conditions. At the end of each day, he returns to a small one-room apartment. He shares this space with his wife Shanti and son, Subhodeep. The family struggles financially. Bapi earns ₹19,000 per month (about USD 215)—barely enough to get by. Despite the hardships, he says the work is still his choice.
“A hard choice, but a choice,” he explains.
Morning rush is hectic for the Mondal family. He points to the wall clock and asks his wife to pack lunch quickly. “All three of us work in different factories in the area,” Mondal says. “We all have to reach work by 8 am.”
Gopal Mondal and his family in the Sundarbans. Gopal still ventures into the forests to collect wild honey. Credit: Diwash Gahatraj/IPS
Shanti, Bapi’s wife, spends her days at a garment factory pressing clothes with a hot iron. She works eight-hour shifts with just one weekly break, earning ₹15,000 per month (about USD 169). Their 19-year-old son, Subhodeep, has also joined his father at the plastic factory. All three now work in Bommasandra, Bangalore’s industrial belt, pooling their wages to survive.
The migration has split their family apart.
“We have an 11-year-old daughter who lives with my in-laws in the Sundarbans,” Shanti explains. The cost of city life forced them to leave their youngest child behind. “It breaks my heart to be apart from my daughter, but we want her to have a good education and life—that’s why we sacrifice,” says Shanti. Her daughter attends school back in the village.
Her job gave her economic independence and a voice in family decisions, like building their new house. Bapi’s family, rooted in the village for centuries, were Mawalis, honey gatherers who knew the forest through knowledge passed down generations.
Still Rooted
Bapi’s father, Gopal Mondal, still ventures into the dangerous forests of Sunderbans. He risks tiger attacks and deadly cyclones to collect wild honey. But the forest that once fed families is now failing them.
Climate change has disrupted everything. Cyclones strike more often and with greater force. The natural flowering cycle has gone haywire. Fish populations in the waters have crashed.
“The honey harvest keeps shrinking and prices keep falling,” Gopal explains.
As Gopal tried to hold on to tradition, his son Bapi could no longer see a future in the same waters and forests.
“The forest no longer provides enough honey or fish,” Bapi shares. The rhythms his ancestors lived by for centuries suddenly made no sense. Faced with shrinking opportunities, Bapi tried other work back home. Besides going to the jungle for honey with his father during the season (April-May), he operated a van gaari—a battery-powered three-wheeler with a wooden platform for passengers. But even that barely paid enough to survive. “There was a time when I struggled to buy a saree for my wife,” he recalls. Migration was the only choice left.
A boat ferries passengers in Sundarbans. Credit: Diwash Gahatraj/IPS
From Forests to Factories
Apart from forced migration, climate change erodes memory, identity, and ancestral knowledge. Leaving the Sundarbans has cost the family more than a homeland.
Bapi still carries traditional skills—navigating treacherous waters by boat and collecting honey deep in the forest.
“I know how to catch shrimp and crabs from the river and sea,” he says. “My father and uncles taught me these skills when I was young.”
His wife, Shanti, nods, adding that she was an expert crab and shrimp collector back in the Sundarbans. “I think I still have it in me,” she says with quiet pride.
But the chain of knowledge is breaking. “I could not pass on that wisdom to my son,” Bapi admits with regret.
Subhodeep represents this lost generation. He finished tenth grade and left his village to join his parents in Bangalore. He has not learned the skills that defined his family for generations. “I have never entered the forest to collect honey or fish back in the village,” Subhodeep explains. “My parents were against it.”
Bon bibi temple in Pakhiralay village. Along with losing traditional livelihoods, religion and cultural life are also in jeopardy. Credit: Diwash Gahatraj/IPS
The irony is stark. Bapi’s parents encouraged him to learn these ancestral skills. But when environmental collapse made these traditions dangerous and unprofitable, Bapi chose to shield his son from them.
For the Mondals, the forest has become too dangerous and unreliable.
“Going to collect honey or catch fish is very unpredictable now,” Bapi explains. Catch volumes have fallen, and tiger attacks have grown. Bapi’s family knows the risk; his grandfather was killed while gathering honey in the forest.
Years earlier, a tiger also attacked Gopal Mondal. He was luckier—he escaped alive but still carries scars on his hand.
These brutal realities shaped Bapi’s decision about his son’s future. “I don’t want my next generation to have such a risky occupation,” he says. The choice is clear. Families can either cling to dangerous traditions that no longer pay enough to survive or abandon their ancestral practices for safer work in distant cities.
Are there other reasons behind the changes in the Sundarbans?
“We can’t just blame climate change and ignore human activities making things worse,” says Professor Tuhin Ghosh of Jadavpur University’s School of Oceanographic Studies. Human activity and climate change create a deadly combination.
People cleared mangroves for farms and fish ponds and built embankments that blocked tidal flows. The result is salt contamination, poisoned soil and water, vanishing species, and a broken landscape.
Uninhabitable Home
About 4.5 million people live across the Sundarbans region in Bangladesh and India. A recent survey reveals the massive scale of climate migration: nearly 59% of households have at least one family member who has moved away for work.
Some studies report 60,000 people migrated from parts of the Sundarbans by 2018. But household surveys show much higher rates because they measure affected families, not just individuals.
These local figures reflect a much bigger crisis. Across Bangladesh, weather-related disasters displaced 7.1 million people in 2022 alone, showing how climate change drives mass movement.
On the Indian side in West Bengal, researchers document large seasonal and permanent migration flows to cities and other states. Families routinely send members to work elsewhere, though official counts are scarce.
Loss Beyond Dollars
Over the past two decades, the Sundarbans has been hit by cyclones made stronger by climate change. They uprooted thousands and caused millions in losses. But beyond disaster relief and migration, a quieter crisis unfolds: the erosion of centuries-old ecological wisdom, culture, and tradition.
Gopal Mondal, in his early sixties, sits outside his modest home in Pakhiralay. When asked about protective equipment for his dangerous work collecting honey in the Sundarbans forest, he holds up a small amulet—a tabeej.
“This and my prayers to Bon Bibi are my protection,” says Mondal, who leads a team of honey collectors into the mangrove forests. “They shield us from storms and babu (tigers).”
The elderly collector recites mantras passed down through generations—teachings from his father or cousins, though he cannot recall exactly who taught him.
“The whole community worships Bon Bibi,” he explains simply
For Sundarbans communities like Mondal’s, Bon Bibi—the “Lady of the Forest”—is a guardian of the mangroves. For centuries, fishermen, honey collectors, and wood gatherers have sought her protection in tiger territory and cyclone-prone waters. Her worship is more than faith; it reflects the people’s bond with a dangerous yet life-sustaining environment, offering both comfort and identity where safety tools are scarce.
When asked about traditional knowledge slipping away from his family, Mondal’s weathered face shows a faint smile.
“Earlier, every fisherman’s family had someone —a son or grandson—who knew how to repair torn nets or mend boats,” he explains. “But in my family, things are slowly changing. My grandsons and sons live too far away, and their visits home are too short to learn these skills.”
The honey collector pauses, watching the distant mangroves. “The younger generation shows very little interest in our profession,” he adds quietly.
Climate migration expert M. Zakir Hossain Khan of Change Initiative, a Bangladesh-based think tank focused on solving critical global challenges, warns that climate-driven displacement from the Sundarbans is destroying centuries-old ways of life that depend entirely on deep knowledge of the forest and rivers.
Fishermen carry rare knowledge of tides, breeding cycles, and mangrove routes, passed down through years of practice. With youth leaving for city jobs, few inherit it. Honey gatherers know how to find hives, protect bees, and survive in tiger territory. As young people turn away, honey collection is fading from the Sundarbans.
A Vanishing Heritage
This generational shift reflects a broader transformation across the Sundarbans. Traditional skills that once defined coastal communities—net weaving, boat building, reading weather patterns, and forest navigation—are disappearing as young people migrate to cities primarily for employment and a few for education.
“Similarly, mangrove-based handicrafts and boat-making using leaves, bamboo, and mangrove wood to make mats, roofing materials, and small boats demand both ecological understanding and artisanal skill, which are now rarely passed down,” comments Khan from Change Initiative.
He adds that herbal medicine and spiritual rituals practiced by local healers using plants like sundari bark and hental are also at risk, as migration and urbanization erode the cultural setting that sustains them.
Culture at Crossroads
Ghosh, who has spent over 30 years working in the Sundarbans, points to a troubling pattern.
“Migration is killing our folk arts,” he says. “Bonbibi stories, jatra pala theater, fishermen’s songs—they’re all disappearing. The people who used to perform during festivals are getting old. And there’s no one to replace them.”
The Sundarbans face a cultural crisis. Traditional performances that once brought villages together during religious festivals now struggle to find performers. Young people who might have learned these arts from their elders are instead leaving for cities for a better life
Once central to life in the Sundarbans, folk traditions like Jatra Pala, Bonbibi tales, and fishermen’s songs now fade with their aging performers. With few young apprentices, a rich cultural heritage risks disappearing—leaving behind a region not just economically changed, but culturally empty.
Note: This story was produced with support from Internews’ Earth Journalism Network
