In this episode of Future Perfect | Futures Antérieur, hosts Liliane Umubyeyi (external link)and Meghna Abraham (external link)welcome Ruth Nyambura (external link), a Kenyan ecofeminist and organizer, to discuss the biodiversity crisis in Africa and its links to colonial and neo-colonial exploitation.
Nyambura explains that biodiversity loss is not just an environmental crisis - it is a political and economic crisis driven by industrial agriculture, extractivism and trade policies that prioritize foreign interests over local communities. Biodiversity loss directly impacts food security, water resources and traditional livelihoods, disproportionately harming local communities, especially women, who are often the primary stewards of land and ecosystems. She highlights the fisheries crisis in Senegal, where EU policies are depleting marine resources and devastating food security and livelihoods.
She criticizes false solutions such as carbon markets and biodiversity credits, which financialize nature while displacing indigenous and local communities. Instead of corporate-led conservation, she calls for anti-capitalist, anti-colonial and feminist approaches that empower communities to protect biodiversity on their own terms.
The episode ends with a powerful message: without systemic change, there can be no biodiversity justice. It is not enough to 'conserve' nature while maintaining economic systems that extract, exploit and destroy. She insists on radical change for true biodiversity justice, including land rights, reparations and grassroots resistance to reclaim ecosystems from exploitative forces.