This year, the International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples recognizes the efforts of Indigenous Youth to support sustainable development, along with their pursuit of justice and preservation of their culture and traditions. The World Bank interviewed Indigenous Youth leaders from Africa, Asia, and Latin America to hear their stories and deepen our understanding of their strategies. While each have experienced unique circumstances, they face similar challenges that put at risk their capacity to sustain their peoples’ significant contributions to conserving the world’s rich cultural and biological diversity.
What kind of adversity do Indigenous Youth face to their cultural identities and unique ways of life?
Like other Indigenous Peoples in Colombia, Dokera’s community has faced the assassination of their leaders, threats to burn down their homes, and forced displacement from their ancestral lands.
Dokera traveled long distances to school, faced discrimination while she was there, and struggled to learn in a language that was not her own, yet persisted in her education. She was chosen by her community to serve as a bridge for external help and at 18 she became the first Indigenous woman from her peoples and region to study at university.
Judy said she suffered from acute sickness as a child as her parents did not trust conventional medicine nor had access to the traditional medicinal products of the forest. She was given a new name and recalls her teacher telling the classroom that the Ogiek people had tails, lived in the forest, and were now extinct. “In fear of what others would say, I lied and said I was Kalenjin, a different group. When the students found out I was Ogiek, I was constantly teased and bullied from that day until I completed my primary education.”
