March 31, 2026
Nia Tero Enters Second Year of Growing Partnerships with African Indigenous Peoples
By Nancy Kelsey (Anishinaabe)
Nia Tero staff and Advisory Council members meet with Mosopisyek Peoples and other African Indigenous leaders in Uganda in 2024. Courtesy of David Rothschild.
Two years ago, Nia Tero engaged in discussions to expand our work in Africa —a continent rich in biocultural diversity and recognized as the cradle of humanity. It is home to vast lands and waters governed by customary systems alongside extensive conservation area networks.
Building partnerships in Africa required several intentional engagements with its Indigenous Peoples.
“Dialogue and conversations are important,” said Kendi Borona, Nia Tero’s Africa Lead based in Kenya. “You can read something that is written about an Indigenous community and still not get the essence or the nuance of their history, their culture, ways of life, traditions, struggles, aspirations, dreams.”
She added, “You also want to create an opportunity for questions to be asked of you as Nia Tero: ‘What is your plan? Where do you work? Why do you work there? How do you work? How do you choose who to work with?’ Those kinds of questions.”
Nia Tero has begun partnerships in the Greater Eastern Africa region with plans in future years to expand to include Indigenous Peoples of other regions of the Congo Basin among others.
Three pillars for ‘true and meaningful partnerships’
Borona and others from the Nia Tero team designed criteria to help guide partnerships with Indigenous Peoples in specific biocultural landscapes.
“The goal is to have true and meaningful partnerships; To make an effort to diffuse the power hierarchy that exists between funders and the funded, which is a real struggle,” she said. “Can we collaborate? Can we think together? Can we all be open about our challenges, about things that we are finding difficult and try and work out solutions together?”
The team embarked on site visits and met with Indigenous women, men, elders, youth and community leaders to better understand ecosystems, challenges, opportunities, and the potential for Nia Tero’s additionality.
“You really get to understand why this land is worth fighting for by being on the land and by hearing how people speak about their land, their histories of struggle,” she said. “These kinds of questions cannot be answered otherwise.”
Nia Tero’s plan for advancing partnerships in the region is rooted in three pillars:
Place-based partnership with Indigenous Peoples
Nia Tero is committed to advancing Indigenous Peoples’ guardianship of their customary lands, primarily through partnerships with pastoralists and hunter-gatherers that include flexible strategic grants. We prioritize efforts that secure land rights and strengthen governance, revitalize culture and identity, cultivate the next generation of leaders and enhance cross-border collaboration.
“We explore and forge custom-designed partnerships with a particular Indigenous community based on their priorities, based on their needs, based on their histories and cultures,” Borona said.Strengthen Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities Movements
In addition to work with specific Indigenous Peoples and their customary lands, Nia Tero works with continent-wide Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (IPLC) movements, as well as national and sub-regional IPLC movements. This includes efforts to strengthen and build unity across IPLC movements and networks throughout the region, and influence policy and conservation outcomes at the national, regional and global levels.In recent years, Indigenous- and Local Community-friendly legal and policy frameworks have emerged across Africa. Leveraging these developments is essential to ensure Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (IPLCs) fully benefit from the protections and opportunities these laws offer. This includes supporting IPLCs to actively participate in key policy spaces – such as United Nations forums, national, subregional platforms and conservation institutions. Ultimately, the goal is to foster guardianship policies on biodiversity and climate change that are grounded in IPLC lived realities and leadership.
The support provided to the Hunter-Gatherer Forum (HUGAFO) during the development of Kenya's Policy on Minorities, Indigenous and Marginalized communities is an example of this work. The passage of this policy seeks to realize the Kenyan constitutional commitments of inclusive governance and justice for all citizens.
- Strategic Storytelling
This pillar is centered on changing narratives about Africa’s Indigenous Peoples – highlighting them as key actors in climate and biodiversity conservation, and as adept agents of their own futures.
Among the many Indigenous Peoples across Africa, stories serve as vessels of history, teachings, and bridges between humans, the environment, and the metaphysical world. Nia Tero will support creating compelling narratives on issues that affect Indigenous Peoples in Africa. This includes amplifying Indigenous-led communications and filmmaking focused on shifting perceptions of Africa’s Indigenous Peoples from marginalization, poverty, and powerlessness to celebrating proud diversity, resilience, agency, and guardianship.
“We must challenge the narratives that have been crafted by people who have not put the effort to go to where our communities live,” said Nia Tero Advisory Council member Dominique Bikaba (Bashi, Democratic Republic of the Congo). “And these must be in languages our people understand.”
Ju'hoan women walking on their lands in Namibia.
Continuing to grow partnerships
Much of Nia Tero's work with Indigenous Peoples in Africa at this time is focused on place-based and network partnerships. But Borona sees the current list of partners growing. That will require continued dialogue with partners, establishing commitments and more.
“This work is a very good opportunity to understand Indigenous Peoples in Africa and also what Nia Tero refers to as Indigenous Peoples’ guardianship in all its variations, in all its shades and colors and sizes within very interesting ecosystems ranging from deserts – proper deserts, semi deserts – tropical forests, savannas and grasslands and water-based ecosystems including wetlands. … It's also an opportunity to understand the cultures and the ways of life of these communities and build solidarity with Indigenous Peoples.”