For Land & Life: The Oakland Institute Podcast

Maasai communities have acted as the ancestral guardians of the Great Rift Valley in East Africa for centuries. Today, they are under attack as the Tanzanian government wages a brutal campaign to forcibly evict them from the Ngorongoro Conservation Area (NCA) to boost tourism revenues. Despite mounting pressures to force them from their homes, Maasai have recently waged a historic protest mobiliza...

After decades of being exploited for natural resources, Papua New Guinea is cracking down. Our guest today is Eddie Tanago, the Campaign Manager at ACT NOW , a PNG-based organization on the forefront against illegal logging and other destructive extractive industries. He discusses the recent historic fine imposed on a logging firm in PNG for tax evasion and the path forward to a truly people-cente...

Summit Carbon Solutions intends to build the world’s largest carbon capture and storage pipeline across the Midwestern US, despite fierce and sustained citizen opposition. While media coverage so far has focused on the opposition white landowners in the path of the proposed route have to the pipelines – this project represents the latest instance of environmental racism as Indigenous, Black, Brown...

As US-based holding company African Agriculture Inc. (AAGR) has filed an initial public offering to fund a large-scale agribusiness project in the northern region of Saint-Louis in Senegal, local communities are demanding the company return their land stolen over a decade ago. Today's episode features an interview with Ardo Sow from the Collectif pour la Défense du Ndiaël, who have been steadfastl...

The world is currently in the midst of a food price crisis , with prices of staple foods and agricultural inputs such as fertilizers and pesticides skyrocketing on global markets. As usual, the most vulnerable are being hit the hardest by these rising prices. The good news is that more and more farmers are breaking free from the reliance on expensive and polluting pesticides and fertilizers to fee...

This episode explores the devastating impact privatized, neocolonial wildlife conservation and safari tourism have had on Indigenous pastoral communities, specifically in Northern Kenya.  Since its founding in 2004, the Northern Rangelands Trust (NRT) has set up 43 "community" conservancies on over 42,000 square kilometers of land in Northern and Coastal Kenya – nearly 8 percent of the country's t...

If you’ve participated in any mobilizations over the past decade, chances are you’ve seen the work of today’s guest, Oakland Institute Senior Fellow David Solnit. A climate justice, global justice, anti-war, arts, and direct action organizer, David is also an author, a puppeteer, and a trainer. He was a key organizer in the shutdowns of the WTO in Seattle in 1999 and in San Francisco the day after...

The second episode in a two part series exploring resistance to the upcoming UN Food Systems Summit and mapping out sustainable, bottom-up approaches to food sovereignty. Featuring Elizabeth Mpofu (La Via Campesina), Alejandro Argumedo (Swift Foundation) & Anuradha Mittal (Oakland Institute) Intro: Chivy Sok Host: Andy Currier For more see: //www.oaklandinstitute.org/food-systems-summit    

The first episode in a two part series exploring resistance to the upcoming UN Food Systems Summit and mapping out sustainable, bottom-up approaches to food sovereignty. Featuring Nnimmo Bassey (Health of Mother Earth Foundation) and Kristen Lyons (Professor of Environment and Development Sociology, U Queensland).  Intro: Chivy Sok Host: Andy Currier For more see: https://www.oaklandinstitute.org/...

Oakland Institute Senior Fellow, journalist and photographer David Bacon discusses the history of exploitation of the H-2A worker program and how it creates a race to the bottom for all farmworkers.  Will the Biden administration protect the profits of growers and expand the H-2A program or will it stand with farmworkers who labor in the fields to keep our country fed? Report: https://www.oaklandi...

Kathryn Manga of KMP (Peasants Movement of the Philippines) joins to discuss how farmers faced with land grabs and violent repression continue to struggle for genuine agrarian reform and a better future in the Philippines.    For the latest news on KMP: https://www.facebook.com/kilusangmagbubukid/ https://twitter.com/kmp_phl Music: Mike Mell

Today's episode features Angely Rodriguez and Maria Ceja - two McDonald’s workers who went on a historic strike in response to the company’s failure to provide the bare minimum to protect its workers as COVID-19 ran rampant through their Telegraph Ave location in North Oakland. To learn more and get involved visit: www.fastfoodjusticeahora.com.  Hosted by Andy Currier Music: Michael & Randy Mell

The Oakland Institute Policy Director Frederic Mousseau joins to discuss how despite an abundance of natural resource wealth, Papua New Guinea’s reliance on large scale extraction projects has failed to provide development for its people. Instead of allowing foreign corporations to evade taxes and bank profits offshore, PNG must change course to provide people centered development.   https://www.o...