In Memoriam
Ben is a writer and designer with more than fifteen years experience in the nonprofit sector. Ben holds a Master of Public Policy from the University of Virginia’s Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy. He previously served as Director of Communications for Madison House, the student volunteer center at the University of Virginia.
As Vice President of Business Development, Devin Welch is responsible for market strategy for Sun Tribe Solar, Virginia’s fastest growing distributed generation solar energy company. Passionate about sustainability, Mr. Welch has spent his career championing free market principles as a means to achieve positive change across a broad range of environmental issues, with a focus on finding and capitalizing upon the critical intersections of sustainable best practices and corporate self-interest. At Sun Tribe Solar, Mr. Welch’s role continues his work on market transformation by engaging with individuals, businesses, and governments to reimagine the way energy is produced while
realizing tangible benefits for all stakeholders.
Prior to co-founding Sun Tribe Solar, Mr. Welch contributed to the World Wildlife Fund’s Markets Initiative, working with strategic corporate partners to develop and achieve ambitious CSR targets and move sustainability to a pre-competitive condition of participation in key commodity markets. Also during his tenure at the World Wildlife Fund, Mr. Welch co-lead the communications strategy for the 2010 Earth Hour, at the time the largest public demonstration in history with the participation from an estimated 90 million Americans.
Mr. Welch’s international experience includes humanitarian work with Karen refugees along the Thai-Burma border as well as the founding of Barefoot Atlas, a volunteer travel network connecting individuals around the world with opportunities to volunteer their skills at locally-led social and environmental projects throughout Central America. He is a co-founder of Virgin Real Estate Development, an environmentally responsible real-estate development company in the Virgin Islands.
Mr. Welch is a founding member of the Virginia Distributed Solar Association, Charlottesville Renewable Energy Alliance and a member of the Virginia Renewable Energy Association. Mr. Welch is a published author and holds a BS in Management from Virginia Tech.
Research and Writing Specialist
Charlie has worked extensively at the intersection of environmental and social issues in Latin America. In conjunction with his position at Amazon Aid, he is a Program Manager for the environmental health non-profit Pure Earth, where he leads a project in the Peruvian Amazon helping artisanal gold miners reduce mercury-use and restore degraded mining areas. Through this work, Charlie traveled to Madre de Dios, Peru in February 2019 to assist with reforestation and learn firsthand about the challenges and marvels of the Amazon Basin.
Charlie holds a master’s degree in Latin American Studies from Columbia University. In his spare time, he enjoys writing, hiking and playing soccer. Born and raised in Charlottesville, Virginia, he is thrilled to be working at the local and global level to protect the diversity of the Amazon.
Consulting Director
Amazon Aid’s Cleaner Gold Network
Christina T Miller is a sustainable jewelry specialist who encourages leadership in positive social change and environmental protection. First trained as an artist, she brings creative problem solving to her work on gold supply chains, jewelry, and community organizing for Amazon Aid Foundation. Miller is the founder and lead consultant of Christina T. Miller Sustainable Jewelry Consulting and provides strategy, guidance, and impact measurement services to clients including jewelry brands and not-for-profits.
As co-founder and former director of Ethical Metalsmiths, Miller worked to create a community of individuals committed to responsible materials sourcing by raising awareness of problems needing attention and working to address them. In 2018 she co-launched Better Without Mercury / Mejor Sin Mercurio, a mercury cleanup and site restoration project at the Gualconda gold mine in Colombia with the mine manager, Rolberto Alvarez. Miller holds a MFA in jewelry and metalsmithing from East Carolina University.
Sarah duPont is an award-winning humanitarian, educator and filmmaker and is a vocal advocate of ecological preservation. As the President and Founder of the Amazon Aid Foundation, Sarah works with Neotropical scientists to study Amazonian biodiversity with an eye toward educating the public and introducing cutting-edge conservation practices and on the ground solutions to the region. Sarah is a producer and co-director of the award winning film River of Gold and the short documentary Mercury Uprising, both films about illicit and unregulated gold mining in the Amazon Rainforest. Her other film projects include producing the award-winning Kids Against Malaria music video P.S.A., a transmedia program to promote treatment and prevention for malaria in Africa and the Anthem for the Amazon music video, a video with the voices of 500 children from around the world singing to protect the Amazon.
Sarah has been engaged in educational innovation for 25 years, creating projects both locally and globally. She works to build cross disciplinary curriculum that support core subjects, including middle and high school STEAM curriculum built around the documentary River of Gold. In the fall of 2010, Sarah, along with Gigi Hancock, wife of legendary jazz great, Herbie Hancock, co–founded CIAMO, an arts and music school based in Benin, Africa. Sarah has had both past and present board experience, serving on the following boards: University of Virginia Children’s Medical Center, the University of Virginia Council for the Arts, the Amazon Conservation Association, the Upton Foundation, Rachel’s Network, the Wake Forest University’s Board of Visitors, the Berklee Global Jazz Institute, and the D.C. Environmental Film Festival. She has been the recipient of the Charlottesville Village Award, the Dorothy Corwin Spirit of Life Award, the Global Syndicate Humanitarian Award, Worldwide Children’s Foundation of New York’s Humanitarian Award, the Hawaii International Film Festival’s Humanitarian Award, and the Pongo Award.
Charles Lyons is a journalist, filmmaker, and professor. He’s written more than a dozen articles for The New York Times, including about the Belo Monte dam in the Amazon and about suicides among the Guarani in the southwest of Brazil. More recently, he produced coverage for PBS NewsHour of the pandemic in Brazil, and about the 2022 Brazilian election, indigenous rights and deforestation while writing about illegal gold mining for Mongabay. Lyons has also made short films on human rights and environmental issues for the United Nations – in Brazil, Japan, and India; and produced a series on climate change for and with PBS NewsHour. Prior to that, he wrote and produced for ABC News and was a staff writer for Variety. Lyons, who holds a doctorate in theater and film studies from Columbia University, is author of the book, The New Censors: Movies and the Culture Wars. He’s taught film classes at Yale, Columbia, UCLA, and Savannah School of Art & Design.
Saleem H. Ali was born in New Bedford, Massachusetts but grew up in Lahore, Pakistan until his college years, receiving his Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from Tufts University, and his Masters and Ph.D. degrees in environmental policy and planning at Yale and MIT, respectively. He currently holds the Blue and Gold Distinguished Professorship in Geography and Spatial Sciences at the University of Delaware(USA) and is Honorary Professor at the University of Queensland (Australia).
Dr. Ali’s laurels include being a National Geographic Explorer (having traveled for research to over 150 countries); being chosen as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum and serving on the seven-member science panel of the Global Environment Facility (the world’s largest multilateral trust fund for the environment held in trusteeship by the World Bank).
Daniel Growald serves as a partner to people and organizations working to align the power of capital with the wisdom of nature. He is the founder of climate finance consultancy GoodClimate; and an Advisor to Amazon Aid Foundation and Pentatonic, a circular economy design and consulting firm that helps leading global brands accelerate their sustainability agendas. Formerly, Daniel cofounded and led the nonprofit climate campaign BankFWD, built startups in digital media and carbon-negative power finance, and worked for a safe drinking water company in rural India. He graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University with a BA in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology focused on the nexus of bioenergy, land use, and climate change in Latin America, and has served as Trustee for the Growald Climate Fund and his late grandfather’s charitable foundation the David Rockefeller Fund. Daniel’s current work is centered on business strategies to incentivize major banks to end financing for fossil fuels, and the design of products, financial vehicles, and legal structures that place business in service to the future of life on Earth.
Chief Marketing Officer, Richline Group Inc., a Berkshire Hathaway Company
Mark has worked over 50 years in the jewelry industry with experience in all facets of management, manufacturing, marketing, sales and corporate responsibility.
He graduated Manhattan College in Science and NYU Stern with an MBA in Marketing.
In 2015 and 2018, Mark was honored as CMO of Year, Corporate Social Responsibility, by the CMO Club. In 2019, he was the recipient of the Women’s Jewelry Association Mentorship Award.
Mark is an active speaker and advocate on responsible issues. He has served as a board member of Richline, Special Olympics, Resolve, Mercury Free Mining and the Responsible Jewellery Council.
Mark Bauman has been recognized with numerous broadcast, web and print journalism honors, including an Emmy, more than a dozen CINE Golden Eagles, and various film festival awards. Before launching a series of startups, he oversaw the Smithsonian Institution’s commercial media units, including Smithsonian and Air & Space magazines, Smithsonian Books, Smithsonian.com and the Smithsonian Channel partnership with Showtime, which grossed more than $60 million dollars per year.
Previously, Bauman served as Chairman of National Geographic’s Cross Platform Committee. He was also Executive Vice President of National Geographic Television, where he oversaw more than 400 hours of programming, and National Geographic’s Digital Studio, which tripled the Society’s YouTube traffic, garnering more than a billion streams.
Before National Geographic, Bauman, who is fluent in Spanish, Russian, Czech and Italian, was based in Eastern Europe and Latin America for ABC News. He has covered war and genocide in Central Africa, Lebanon, Bosnia, Afghanistan and Iraq for some of the best broadcast and print media outlets in the world.
Bauman serves on a number of NGO Boards, including: The Charles Darwin Foundation for the Galapagos Islands Board; The Antarctic & Southern Ocean Coalition Board. The Marine Fish Conservation Network Board; Chairman: Advisory Board for the Washington Youth Summit on the Environment.
Jessie Nagel is a communications specialist who brings decades of experience along with a passion for the environment, sustainability, and the arts, to her work as Chief Strategist with Amazon Aid Foundation. Nagel is the co-founder of communications agency Hype,
which offers public relations, marketing, and social media services to creative content providers in entertainment as well as select non-profit and independent business clients.
As the Chair of the Care Committee for the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP), Nagel helped create the organization’s Sustainable Production Guidelines. She also helped develop and launch Green The Bid, an initiative aimed at shifting the
production industry to zero-waste, carbon neutral, sustainable and regenerative practices, and is a founding member of the professional organization Women In Animation. Nagel holds a B.A. in Film with a minor in Fine Arts and Anthropology from San Francisco
State University.
Sissy Spacek has been one of the film industry’s most respected actresses for more than three decades. Her many honors include an Academy Award, five additional Oscar nominations, three Golden Globe Awards and numerous critics awards. In 1980, Spacek starred as Loretta Lynn in the acclaimed biopic‚ Miner’s Daughter, winning the Oscar and Golden Globe Award for her performance. Her most recent Oscar nomination came for her portrayal of a mother grieving for her murdered son in the drama, the Bedroom, for which she also won a Golden Globe Award, an Independent Spirit Award, and an AFI Film Award for Best Actress. Spacek most recently starred in Low alongside Robert Duvall and Bill Murray and recently received an Emmy nomination for her guest role on HBO’s series Big Love. She also played in the film adaptation of New York Times best-seller‚ The Help. Throughout her career, Spacek has balanced her career in entertainment with supporting organizations that help animals, support family farms, advocate for the protection of free speech, and educate people on environment.
Susan Wheeler is a responsible jewelry advocate, she works to bring together people across the global jewelry supply chain to participate equally within the jewelry industry. As founder of The Responsible Jewelry Transformative, she works on the mission of uniting and transforming the jewelry industry around responsible practices so that it may help achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Susan works through education, initiatives and community. She brings to the Clean Gold Campaign a passion for collaboration and outreach. Susan is also a jewelry designer who uses her jewelry to highlight jewelry industry initiatives and positive narratives from miners and laborers whose work, community and environments are integral to her jewelry creation.
Benjamin Vauter is an International Environmental Program Specialist with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of International Affairs where he focuses on international mercury issues, including support for global implementation of the Minamata Convention on Mercury. Ben is the EPA’s lead for efforts to reduce mercury use in artisanal and small-scale gold mining. Before joining the EPA eight years ago, Ben served as a U.S. Peace Corps volunteer in Guatemala where he spent 1.5 years living and working in an indigenous Mayan community. During his time with the Peace Corps, Ben supported community driven programs to address local environmental issues ranging from natural resource conservation to solid waste management. Ben received his bachelor’s degree in Finance & International Business from The University of Pittsburgh and is currently completing a Master of Science degree in Environmental Sciences and Policy at Johns Hopkins University with a focus in Sustainable Business.
Executive Director Center for Amazonia Scientific Innovation
Luis E. Fernandez is the Executive Director of the Wake Forest University’s Center for Amazonian Scientific Innovation (CINCIA), a research initiative that examines the impacts of artisanal gold mining, mercury contamination, and deforestation on natural and human ecosystems in the Peruvian Amazon. Luis is also a Research Associate Professor in the Department of Biology and a Fellow at Wake Forest University’s Center for Energy, Environment, and Sustainability (CEES). Trained as a tropical ecologist, Luis is an expert on the environmental impacts of artisanal scale mining on tropical landscapes, particularly on the effects of mercury contamination on wildlife and indigenous communities. Luis has led research efforts to study and address mining-related mercury contamination in Brazil, Colombia, Peru, and Madagascar. He has held professional positions at Stanford University, Carnegie Institution for Science, US Environmental Protection Agency, Argonne National Laboratory, and the University of Michigan. His research and policy work has been profiled in Nature, CNN, NPR, PBS Newshour, Washington Post, Mongabay, Le Monde, and the Associated Press. Luis serves on the governing and advisory boards of the Amazon Aid Foundation, Environmental Health Council, OroEco, and the UNEP PlanetGold programme. In 2009, the USEPA awarded Luis the agency’s highest award, the EPA’s Gold Medal for Outstanding Service, for his work on the dynamics of mercury in the Amazon Basin.a research ecologist at the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Global Ecology, and is the director of the Carnegie Amazon Mercury Project (CAMEP), a multi-institution research initiative that examines the impacts of artisanal gold mining, mercury contamination and deforestation on natural and human ecosystems in the Peruvian Amazon. His research focuses on improving understanding of the global mercury cycle, particularly emissions from the artisanal gold mining sector, and its regional and global effects on forests, ecosystems and human populations.
Dr. Silman is a Professor of Biology. His work centers on understanding biodiversity distribution and the response of forests ecosystems to past and future climate and land use changes.
His current projects also address Andean and Amazonian carbon cycles and biodiversity controls for use in innovative, private- and public-sector, ecosystem services projects that change land use by generating revenue for conservation and creating economic and social value for local participants.
He has 20 years of experience in the Andes and Amazon and is coordinator and founding member of the Andes Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research Group. Silman has authored 56 papers and received 16 grants totaling $2.2M.
Dr Miles Silman’s association with the Amazon Aid Foundation runs deep. Miles has been a constant supporter since its inception and has assisted the organization with his expertise and knowledge of the Amazon. Mile’s was a primary consultant for the documentary Amazon Gold and was critical for helping promote and create our Acre Care donation platform.
Miles is an Associate Professor of Biology and Director of the Center for Energy, Environment, and Sustainability at Wake Forest University. “My primary interests are community composition and dynamics of Andean and Amazonian tree communities in both space and time. The lab’s current research focuses on combining modern- and paleo-ecology to understand tree distributions and plant-climate relationships in the Andes and Amazon. The work is focused on the Peruvian and Bolivian Andes and the adjacent Amazonian plain, with a particular emphasis in distributions along environmental gradients, be they in space or time, and includes both empirical work and modeling.”
Dr. Silman is a Professor of Biology. His work centers on understanding biodiversity distribution and the response of forests ecosystems to past and future climate and land use changes.
His current projects also address Andean and Amazonian carbon cycles and biodiversity controls for use in innovative, private- and public-sector, ecosystem services projects that change land use by generating revenue for conservation and creating economic and social value for local participants.
He has 20 years of experience in the Andes and Amazon and is coordinator and founding member of the Andes Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research Group. Silman has authored 56 papers and received 16 grants totaling $2.2M.
Dr Miles Silman’s association with the Amazon Aid Foundation runs deep. Miles has been a constant supporter since its inception and has assisted the organization with his expertise and knowledge of the Amazon. Mile’s was a primary consultant for the documentary Amazon Gold and was critical for helping promote and create our Acre Care donation platform.
Miles is an Associate Professor of Biology and Director of the Center for Energy, Environment, and Sustainability at Wake Forest University. “My primary interests are community composition and dynamics of Andean and Amazonian tree communities in both space and time. The lab’s current research focuses on combining modern- and paleo-ecology to understand tree distributions and plant-climate relationships in the Andes and Amazon. The work is focused on the Peruvian and Bolivian Andes and the adjacent Amazonian plain, with a particular emphasis in distributions along environmental gradients, be they in space or time, and includes both empirical work and modeling.”
Thomas E. Lovejoy is a Senior Fellow at the United Nations Foundation and Professor of Environmental Science and Policy at George Mason University. Lovejoy, a tropical biologist and conservation biologist, has worked in the Amazon of Brazil since 1965. He received his B.S. and Ph.D. in biology from Yale University.
From 1973 to 1987 he directed the conservation program at World Wildlife Fund-U.S., and from 1987 to 1998 he served as Assistant Secretary for Environmental and External Affairs for the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., and in 1994 became Counselor to the Secretary for Biodiversity and Environmental Affairs. From 1999 to 2002, he served as chief biodiversity adviser to the President of the World Bank. In 2010 and 2011, he served as Chair of the Independent Advisory Group on Sustainability for the Inter-American Development Bank. He is Senior Adviser to the President of the United Nations Foundation, chair of the Yale Institute for Biospheric Studies, and is past president of the American Institute of Biological Sciences, past chairman of the United States Man and Biosphere Program, and past president of the Society for Conservation Biology.
Thomas Lovejoy developed the debt-for-nature swaps, in which environmental groups purchase shaky foreign debt on the secondary market at the market rate, which is considerably discounted, and then convert this debt at its face value into the local currency to purchase biologically sensitive tracts of land in the debtor nation for purposes of environmental protection. Critics of the ‘debt-for-nature’ schemes, such as National Center for Public Policy Research, which distributes a wide variety of materials consistently justifying corporate freedom and environmental deregulation, aver that plans deprive developing nations of the extractable raw resources that are currently essential to further economic development. Economic stagnation and local resentment of “Yankee imperialism” can result, they warn. In reality, no debt-for-nature swap occurs without the approval of the country in question.
Thomas Lovejoy has also supported the Forests Now Declaration, which calls for new market-based mechanisms to protect tropical forests. Lovejoy played a central role in the establishment of conservation biology, by initiating the idea and planning with B. A. Wilcox in June 1978 for The First International Conference on Research in Conservation Biology, that was held in La Jolla, in September 1978. The proceedings, introduced conservation biology to the scientific community. Lovejoy serves on many scientific and conservation boards and advisory groups, is the author of numerous articles and books. As often mis-associated, he is not the founder but served as an advisor in the early days of the public television series NATURE, which he’s no longer part of the creative team.
He has served in an official capacity in the Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton administrations.
Lovejoy predicted in 1980 (see quote below), that 10–20 percent of all species on earth would have gone extinct by the year 2020. In 2001, Lovejoy was the recipient of the University of Southern California’s Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement. Thomas Lovejoy has been granted the 2008 BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in the Ecology and Conservation Biology category (ex aequo with William F. Laurance). In 2004, a new wasp species that acts as a parasite on butterfly larvae was discovered on the Pacific slope of the Talamanca mountain range in Costa Rica by Ronald Zúñiga, a specialist in bees, wasps and ants at the National Biodiversity Institute (INBio). INBio named the species polycyrtus lovejoyi in honor of Thomas Lovejoy for his contributions in the world of biodiversity and support for INBio.
On October 31, 2012, Dr. Thomas Lovejoy was awarded the Blue Planet Prize for being “the first scientist to academically clarify how humans are causing habitat fragmentation and pushing biological diversity towards crisis.” He has served on the Board of Directors since 2009 for the Amazon Conservation Association, whose mission is to conserve the biological diversity of the Amazon. He is also on the Board of Directors for Population Action International.
Thomas E. Lovejoy is a Senior Fellow at the United Nations Foundation and Professor of Environmental Science and Policy at George Mason University. Lovejoy, a tropical biologist and conservation biologist, has worked in the Amazon of Brazil since 1965. He received his B.S. and Ph.D. in biology from Yale University.
From 1973 to 1987 he directed the conservation program at World Wildlife Fund-U.S., and from 1987 to 1998 he served as Assistant Secretary for Environmental and External Affairs for the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., and in 1994 became Counselor to the Secretary for Biodiversity and Environmental Affairs. From 1999 to 2002, he served as chief biodiversity adviser to the President of the World Bank. In 2010 and 2011, he served as Chair of the Independent Advisory Group on Sustainability for the Inter-American Development Bank. He is Senior Adviser to the President of the United Nations Foundation, chair of the Yale Institute for Biospheric Studies, and is past president of the American Institute of Biological Sciences, past chairman of the United States Man and Biosphere Program, and past president of the Society for Conservation Biology.
Thomas Lovejoy developed the debt-for-nature swaps, in which environmental groups purchase shaky foreign debt on the secondary market at the market rate, which is considerably discounted, and then convert this debt at its face value into the local currency to purchase biologically sensitive tracts of land in the debtor nation for purposes of environmental protection. Critics of the ‘debt-for-nature’ schemes, such as National Center for Public Policy Research, which distributes a wide variety of materials consistently justifying corporate freedom and environmental deregulation, aver that plans deprive developing nations of the extractable raw resources that are currently essential to further economic development. Economic stagnation and local resentment of “Yankee imperialism” can result, they warn. In reality, no debt-for-nature swap occurs without the approval of the country in question.
Thomas Lovejoy has also supported the Forests Now Declaration, which calls for new market-based mechanisms to protect tropical forests. Lovejoy played a central role in the establishment of conservation biology, by initiating the idea and planning with B. A. Wilcox in June 1978 for The First International Conference on Research in Conservation Biology, that was held in La Jolla, in September 1978. The proceedings, introduced conservation biology to the scientific community. Lovejoy serves on many scientific and conservation boards and advisory groups, is the author of numerous articles and books. As often mis-associated, he is not the founder but served as an advisor in the early days of the public television series NATURE, which he’s no longer part of the creative team.
He has served in an official capacity in the Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton administrations.
Lovejoy predicted in 1980 (see quote below), that 10–20 percent of all species on earth would have gone extinct by the year 2020. In 2001, Lovejoy was the recipient of the University of Southern California’s Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement. Thomas Lovejoy has been granted the 2008 BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in the Ecology and Conservation Biology category (ex aequo with William F. Laurance). In 2004, a new wasp species that acts as a parasite on butterfly larvae was discovered on the Pacific slope of the Talamanca mountain range in Costa Rica by Ronald Zúñiga, a specialist in bees, wasps and ants at the National Biodiversity Institute (INBio). INBio named the species polycyrtus lovejoyi in honor of Thomas Lovejoy for his contributions in the world of biodiversity and support for INBio.
On October 31, 2012, Dr. Thomas Lovejoy was awarded the Blue Planet Prize for being “the first scientist to academically clarify how humans are causing habitat fragmentation and pushing biological diversity towards crisis.” He has served on the Board of Directors since 2009 for the Amazon Conservation Association, whose mission is to conserve the biological diversity of the Amazon. He is also on the Board of Directors for Population Action International.
Julian Freeman is the operations coordinator for Amazon Aid Foundation and has worked in the similar field for the last 3 years, most recently with the Charlottesville based company CoConstruct. In her downtime she loves hiking, mountain biking and playing with her two dogs.
Communications Strategy Consultant, “River of Gold”
Kathleen is an experienced Communications Strategist working in the human rights sector across issues such as global health, international anti-genocide efforts, poverty alleviation, women’s empowerment and education reform, among others.
She works with for profit and nonprofit organizations to design and execute human rights and social impact campaigns aimed at alleviating human suffering and uplifting the dignity of every human being. She develops social media strategies, sets goals and builds campaign content plans in service of building awareness about issues, mobilizing people toward advocacy, and arming them to take action in support of these goals. She has worked on several film impact campaigns including The Promise, Bending the Arc, The Heart of Nuba, Birthright: A War Story, Cries from Syria, and Intent to Destroy.
She has a Master’s Degree in Communication Management from University of Southern California and Bachelor’s Degree in International Relations and World Politics from Vanderbilt University.
Bonnie Abaunza has dedicated her life to humanitarian work, human rights and social justice advocacy. Through the Abaunza Group she works closely with filmmakers, artists, production companies, distributors and non-governmental organizations to develop and execute social impact campaigns for films and documentaries. Bonnie’s work has addressed myriad human rights and civil rights issues as she has brought hard-hitting campaigns and major celebrity engagement to issues as diverse as child slavery, campus sexual assault, human trafficking, genocide, environmental justice, girls education, food safety and animal rights.
Her campaigns have moved the needle on critical issues including genocide awareness with the Hotel Rwanda campaign, conflict diamonds with Blood Diamond, abuses by the food industry with Food, Inc., campus sexual assault with The Hunting Ground, online sex trafficking with I Am Jane Doe, animal rescue with Harry and Snowman, the plight of refugees with Cries From Syria and girls’ education with The Breadwinner. Bonnie designed and executed the social impact campaigns for the feature film The Promise by Oscar winner Terry George, and the documentary Intent to Destroy, both about the Armenian genocide. Presently, she is running the impact campaigns for The Heart of Nuba, Birthright: A War Story, River of Gold about illicit and unregulated gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon, and the upcoming documentary Cracked Up. She is a consultant to National Women’s Law Center. She has worked on over 30 campaigns, with 14 of the films being nominated for numerous awards, including Oscar and Emmy Awards.
Bonnie spearheaded the campaign on Diane Warren and Lady Gaga’s song Til it Happens to You from The Hunting Ground’s soundtrack. The song was nominated for an Oscar and won an Emmy. Lady Gaga performed the song at the 2016 Oscars. The music video has been viewed over 42 million times and has been embraced as the anthem for the movement to end sexual assault on college campuses.
As a consultant for the United Nations agency, the International Labour Organization, she assisted with outreach to the entertainment community. She launched the ILO’s artist engagement program, Artworks (http://www.iloartworks.org) and spearheaded their End Slavery Now , 50 for Freedom, and Red Card to Child Labour campaigns.
From 2009-2014, Bonnie led the Special Projects & Philanthropy division for Academy Award winning composer, Hans Zimmer. Her initiatives included raising humanitarian aid for Haiti, Pakistan and Japan for International Medical Corps, and working with Madeleine Albright and the National Democratic Institute to advocate for the disenfranchised Romani people in Europe. She launched a successful online advocacy effort with Elizabeth Warren for passage of the Dodd-Frank Bill and the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
Prior to joining Hans Zimmer’s company in 2009, Bonnie served as Vice President, Social Action and Advocacy at Participant Media, where she developed social action campaigns to promote the documentaries and feature films produced by Participant Media. From 2001 to 2007 she served as Director of the Artists for Amnesty program for Amnesty International from 2001 to 2007, raising Amnesty’s profile in the entertainment industry and the visibility of human rights campaigns with the public. She co-produced four film festivals, four Academy Awards viewing parties to benefit Amnesty, produced quarterly entertainment industry salons and more than 50 feature and documentary screening events, fundraisers and art exhibits. She worked on numerous high profile campaigns including human trafficking and slavery, ending rape as a tool of war, rehabilitation of child soldiers, justice for the murdered women of Juarez, ending small arms trafficking, protecting the rights of indigenous peoples, and other global issues.
Artists for Amnesty ambassadors and supporters included: Salma Hayek, Jennifer Lopez, Nicolas Cage, Halle Berry, Mira Sorvino, Patrick Stewart, Benicio del Toro, Don Cheadle, Leonardo diCaprio, Jennifer Connelly, Djimon Hounsou, Ryan Gosling, Oliver Stone, Hans Zimmer, Paul Greengrass, America Ferrera, Charlize Theron, Tom Morello, Gregory Nava, Patricia Arquette, Yoko Ono, Geoffrey Rush, Phillip Noyce, Martin Sheen, Antonio Banderas, Emma Thompson and others.
Her Artists for Amnesty events were covered by the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Washington Post, London Telegraph, Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, TIME, People Magazine, US weekly, Variety, Billboard, Hollywood Reporter and international publications and news networks.
Bonnie has received commendations for her human rights work from the United States Congress and from the City of Los Angeles. She received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the organization, Unlikely Heroes, Women in Leadership Award from the City of West Hollywood, Global Champion Award from the International Medical Corps., KCET’s Local Hero/Hispanic Heritage Award, and was named Goodwill Ambassador to the Government of East Timor (appointed by President and Nobel Peace Laureate, Jose Ramos-Horta). She is a Senior Non-Resident Fellow for Enough Project, Board member of the ACLU Foundation of Southern California, Chairman of the Advisory Board of thecommunity.com’s Human Rights Campaign, Board member, Not On Our Watch and Board member of the Mgrublian Human Rights Center.
Susan Egan Keane is the Senior Director of Global Strategies, in the International Program of the Natural Resources Defense Council. Susan is a public health specialist with over 30 years of experience working on domestic and international environmental health issues. Her work has covered a range of topics, including control of toxic chemicals, air pollution regulation, pesticides management, and water quality standards and criteria, as well as several regions of the world, including Africa, East Asia/ Central Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean and the Middle East. Most recently Susan has focused her advocacy on reducing global mercury pollution, particularly in artisanal and small-scale gold mining. She was directly engaged with governments during the negotiations of the Minamata Convention on Mercury, which entered into force in August of 2017. She is now working with the UN agencies, countries and NGOs to put the Convention into action. In particular, she is working with the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and UNEP on the GEF-funded planetGOLD programme to reduce mercury use in artisanal and small-scale gold mining in eight countries. She is also the co-leader of the ASGM Area of the United Nations Environment Program Global Mercury Partnership. Susan holds a Master’s degree in environmental health management from the Harvard School of Public Health.
Angel Camacho is a criminal analyst with over 10 years of experience working transnational organized crime matters. He specializes in diversification of criminal activity in the Western Hemisphere, tracking the evolution and complexity of criminal networks traditionally only associated with narcotics trafficking. Since 2015, his focused has been the exploitation of illegal mining operations by transnational criminal organizations in Latin America, both as a profitable illicit revenue stream and as an effective money laundering vector. His on-the-ground experience in the region covers the hemisphere having worked with law enforcement in Canada, Mexico, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Peru, Chile, and the Dominican Republic. The foundation provides him with an opportunity to use an amalgamation of his criminal justice degree from Florida Atlantic University and Film degree from theMiami International University of Art & Design. Angel was born and raised in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Dr. Michelle L. Klosterman is the Director of Academic Development and Assessment in the Provost Office of Global Affairs and an Instructor in the Department of Communication. She also serves as a board member of the Wake Forest University (WFU) Center for Energy, Environment, and Sustainability (CEES). Michelle is responsible for precollege and college bridge programming for WFU aimed at providing domestic and international students with experiences and resources for success in collegiate environments. Michelle works both domestically and internationally developing, implementing, and evaluating K12 curricula. Michelle was an Assistant Professor of Science Education at the University of Missouri and at Wake Forest University where she worked extensively on professional development teams around the National Science Education Standards (NSES). She earned her Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction from the University of Florida with a focus in science education, a B.E. in biomedical engineering and a M.Ed. in science education from Vanderbilt University. She has served as CoPI for several NSF and foundation grants, published two curricula funded by NSF, and was the Project Director for a FLDOE MSP grant. Michelle has also taught secondary biology, physics, world cultures, and geography.
As Senior Vice President, Government Relations, at BMI, Fred Cannon is responsible for coordinating and overseeing BMI’s legislative efforts in conjunction with all departments, as well as with the company’s lobbying firms in Washington, DC and in states across the country. Until its closure in May 2010, he served as Vice Chair of BMI’s political action committee, the BMI Legislative Fund for Authors, Composers and Publishers. A lobbyist, hit songwriter and record producer, Cannon is based in BMI’s New York office.
Prior to joining BMI, Cannon held senior management positions with EMI Records in Italy and England, where he worked with such superstars as Paul McCartney, Queen, Elton John and Michael Jackson. He was Managing Director of The Voice of the Daily American where he was also a popular radio personality in Rome, Italy.
From 1979 to 1988, he was Managing Director and CEO of Carrere Records in the UK, signing such international acts as the Buggles and Rose Tattoo, and assisting with the production of many hit records. From 1988 to 1992, he was International Director of British record and music publishing company, PWL, which charted over 100 top 40 hits and 16 number ones.
In addition, Cannon served as Supervising Producer of the World Music Awards in Monte Carlo from 1989 to 2001. Cannon served as a member of the British Institute of Marketing from 1977 to 1988, and was named a Fellow of the British Institute of Directors in 1985. Cannon received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Whittier College in California.
Greg Asner, a scientist with the Carnegie Institute’s Department of Global Ecology since 2001, is a pioneer of new methods for investigating tropical deforestation, degradation, ecosystem diversity, invasive species, carbon emissions, climate change, and much more using satellite and airborne instrumentation. His innovations measure the chemistry, structure, biomass, and biodiversity of the Earth in unprecedented detail over massive areas not thought possible before. He has developed new technologies for conservation assessments, including tropical forest carbon emissions and stocks, hydrologic function and biodiversity. He leads the CLASLite forest change mapping project, spectranomics biodiversity project, and the one-of-a-kind Carnegie Airborne Observatory.
Asner received his bachelor’s, master’s, and Ph.D. from the University of Colorado at Boulder in environmental engineering, biogeography, and environmental biology, respectively. In 2006, his research was designated a Science Magazine Breakthrough of the Year. In 2007, Popular Science magazine selected him as one of its Brilliant Ten young scientists. In addition to his work at the interface of ecosystems, land use and climate change, Asner is heavily engaged in teaching others to use his technology for tropical forest management and conservation. His research has led to some 340 publications, with dozens more in the pipeline.
Greg has applied his work to environmental problems in tropical forests and arid ecosystems of the world. From the American Southwest to the Brazilian Amazon, he has developed new ways to detect land degradation resulting from human activities and climate change. In places like the Southwestern US and Argentina, he uses instruments on aircraft – from helicopters to high-flying surveillance planes – to measure the structure and chemistry of arid ecosystems as they change to deserts, a process known as desertification. In the Amazon Basin, Asner and his colleagues have combined extensive field studies and satellite technologies to quantify for the first time the extent and ecological impacts of timber harvests and mining on the tropical forest.
Born and Raised in Chile, Patricia Zarate came to the US at age 20. Patricia holds a Bachelors Degree in Music Therapy from Berklee College of Music and a Master’s Degree in Jazz Studies from New York University.
She has taught private saxophone Instruction as a Teaching Assistant at Howard University in Washington DC, and Ethnomusicology at University of Maryland. Zarate has published music therapy articles in the Journal of Medicine of Chile, Journal of Pediatrics of Chile, Medical Journal of Panama, worked as music therapy intern at the New Hampshire Psychiatric Hospital, and in January of 2013 founded the 1st Latin American Music Therapy Symposium in Panama City.
Patricia has performed as a professional saxophonist with a variety of bands in diverse settings in the US and Latin America, and currently works as Outreach Coordinator (and is part of the Advisory Board) for the Berklee Global Jazz Institute (at Berklee College of Music). She has presented her research about “Music as a Tool for Social Change” at the New England Region Music Therapy Meetings (Vermont and Newport), the Meeting of the Journal of Arts and Science (at Harvard University), Berklee Global Jazz Institute (MA), Conservatory of Paris (France), among other places. Patricia currently lives in Quincy, MA with her husband and her 3 homeschooled children.
Adrian Forsyth is the President and co-founder of Amazon Conservation Association, has a Harvard PhD in tropical ecology and 30 years of conservation experience in the region. He has served as the Director of Biodiversity Science at the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and as Vice President at Conservation International. He is currently VP for Programs at the Blue Moon Fund and research associate at the Smithsonian Institution.
He also serves as president of the Board of Friends of the Osa, a nonprofit in Costa Rica. Adrian has supported his fieldwork by serving as a university professor, professional conservationist, and consultant. He is also one of North America’s finest writers on the subject of natural history and has authored nine books.
An ethnographer, writer, photographer, and filmmaker, Davis holds degrees in anthropology and biology and received his Ph.D. in ethnobotany, all from Harvard University. Mostly through the Harvard Botanical Museum, he spent over three years in the Amazon and Andes as a plant explorer, living among fifteen indigenous groups in eight Latin American nations while making some 6000 botanical collections.
In 1974, at the age of 20, he crossed the Darien Gap on foot in the company of the celebrated English author and amateur explorer, Sebastian Snow. His work later took him to Haiti to investigate folk preparations implicated in the creation of zombies, an assignment that led to his writing Passage of Darkness (1988) and The Serpent and the Rainbow (1986), an international best seller later released by Universal as a motion picture.
His other books include Penan: Voice for the Borneo Rain Forest (1990), Shadows in the Sun (1993), Nomads of the Dawn (1995), The Clouded Leopard (1998), Rainforest (1998), Light at the Edge of the World (2001), The Lost Amazon (2004), Grand Canyon (2008), Book of Peoples of the World (ed. 2008) and One River (1996), which was nominated for the 1997 Governor General’s Literary Award for Nonfiction. His books have been translated into fourteen languages, including Basque, Serbian, Japanese and Malay.
A native of British Columbia, Davis, a licensed river guide, has worked as park ranger, forestry engineer, and conducted ethnographic fieldwork among several indigenous societies of northern Canada. He has published 180 scientific and popular articles on subjects ranging from Haitian vodoun and Amazonian myth and religion to the global biodiversity crisis, the traditional use of psychotropic drugs, and the ethnobotany of South American Indians. Davis has written for National Geographic, Newsweek, Premiere, Outside, Omni, Harpers, Fortune, Men’s Journal, Condé Nast Traveler, Natural History, Scientific American, National Geographic Traveler, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, The Globe and Mail, and numerous other international publications. Davis is a Fellow of the International League of Conservation Photographers (iLCP).
His photographs have appeared in some 20 books and more than 80 magazines, journals and newspapers, including National Geographic, Time, Geo, People, Men’s Journal, Outside, and National Geographic Adventure. They have been exhibited at the International Center of Photography (I.C.P.), the Marsha Ralls Gallery, Washington, D.C., the United Nations (Cultures on the Edge exhibition 2004), the Carpenter Center of Harvard University, and the Utama Center, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Select images are part of the permanent collection of the U.S. State Department, Africa and Latin America Bureaus.
Davis is the co-curator of The Lost Amazon: The Photographic Journey of Richard Evans Schultes, first exhibited at the National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, and currently touring Latin America.
A first collection of Davis’ photographs, Light at the Edge of the World, appeared in 2001 published by National Geographic Books, Bloomsbury and Douglas & McIntyre. A second collection is under contract for fall 2011 publication with Douglas & McIntyre.
Davis’ research has been the subject of more than 800 media reports and interviews in Europe, North and South America and the Far East, and has inspired numerous documentary films as well as three episodes of the television series, The X-Files.
A professional speaker for over twenty years, Davis has lectured at the American Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, California Academy of Sciences, Missouri Botanical Garden, Field Museum of Natural History, New York Botanical Garden, National Geographic Society, Royal Ontario Museum, the Explorer’s Club, the Royal Geographical Society, the Oriental Institute, the Chattaugua Institute, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank as well as some 400 renowned educational institutions, including Harvard, M.I.T., Oxford, Yale, Stanford, U.C. Berkeley, Duke, Vanderbilt, University of Pennsylvania, Tulane, Georgetown, and St. George’s School.
Justin Fishkin marries a lifelong dedication to sustainability and making a difference in the world with a background in finance and investing.
Prior to joining Local Motors, he served as Senior Portfolio Manager of Carbon War Room, an NGO founded by Sir Richard Branson to identify and implement entrepreneurial solutions to climate change. Justin began his career at Goldman Sachs in investment banking. He then joined Lazard, followed by SAC Capital Advisors.
In his spare time, Justin founded The Holster Project, co-founded digital indie record label Holster Records, serves on the Board of Street Soccer USA, remains a Senior Advisor to Carbon War Room, and recently ran his first marathon. Justin graduated with a BA in Economics from Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. He was born and raised in Washington, D.C.
Bill Stetson, Director of External Affairs at the Environmental Film Festival, is a film producer, as well as an environmental and political adviser. He has produced several documentaries, including the PBS AIDS feature, “A Closer Walk” (2006), and, most recently, the award-winning “Wisconsin Rising” (2014).
In 1996, he established the Vermont Film Commission and served as its president for a decade. Bill currently advises Vermont’s Governor Peter Shumlin on issues of energy and environment.
In April 2011, he was appointed by the White House as a member of the President’s Advisory Committee on the Arts (PACA).
Bill has served on several media, foundation, and environmental boards, including the founding board of the Harvard University Center for the Environment, where he received a bachelor’s degree and subsequently studied at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (energy economics and policy).
Enrique Ortiz was born and raised in Lima. He is trained as a tropical ecologist (San Marcos University, Lima, Princeton University, New Jersey), with a long history of research on species and ecological systems in coastal/marine, deserts, highlands and tropical forest ecosystems.
His specialty is on community ecology (plant animal interactions) and has authored several research papers and popular articles on a variety of themes, mainly on species biology, and management of non-timber forest products, particularly on Brazil nuts. Enrique has a solid knowledge of tropical forests (locally and regionally), from biological, social, economic and political perspectives.
Apart from his biological background, Enrique is perhaps better known for his activism and leadership in Peru and Latin America in conservation of biodiversity and ecosystems. He has worked with several Peruvian, Amazonian and North American non-governmental organizations. He is a founder and board member of the Amazon Conservation Association and President of the Asociacion para la Conservacion de la Cuenca Amazonica, a leading peruvian NGO. For over a decade he has worked for funding agencies in efforts to support conservation in the Andes-Amazon region. Together with Adrian Forsyth, Enrique is the founder of the Andes Amazon Program of the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. Since 2010, he is s Senior Program Officer for the Amazon Program at the Blue Moon Fund, working in a team with A. Forsyth and Bruce Babbitt supporting local and international groups in efforts to protect amazon rainforests. In addition to it, he is currently serving in the board of directors of the National Protected Area System of the Environment Ministry of the Peruvian Government.
Enrique is also an active outdoorsman. Enrique now drives his motorcycle in the roads of Eastern USA. He lives in Washington DC, and travels frequently to Amazonian counties and other unpredictable wilderness spots.
One thing that caught my attention deeply was the idea of how reforestation worked as an improvisation. You plant something in nature, but then nature improvises; you don’t know how it’s going to come out. I started putting concepts together, like the way the trees behave with a certain rhythm, and the timing that needs to happen. That’s where the first symphony in the world comes from: the jungle. I became fascinated with that.
“When you grow up in Panama, you grew up very close to nature. When we were kids, we used to go to the river [with my father], and he would point out the whistle of the birds. I found it fascinating from early on, the way they whistled…. Then I got into [Olivier] Messiaen. He studied bird calls and wrote a series of harmonies about them.[Later in life,] I started meeting people that started to kind of show me the direction to go. Nathan Gray, who’s the CEO of EarthTrain, and my wife, we started going on journeys deep into the jungle. When I went in, it brought a lot of things together. I already felt I knew what to do while I was in that environment, what to listen for.
One thing that caught my attention deeply was the idea…of how reforestation worked as an improvisation. You plant something in nature, but then nature improvises; you don’t know how it’s going to come out. I started putting concepts together, like the way the trees behave with a certain rhythm, and the timing that needs to happen. That’s where the first symphony in the world comes from: the jungle. I became fascinated with that.I realized that the closer I got to nature, the more [I thought of] the idea of human development. One day we went to a river for example, and I could drink water from the river. And I had this feeling like, “Wow, how far have we come from this, buying Evian water.” So for me, it connected how humans, the way we’re developed, takes us on this path of destruction. Why are we trying to destroy nature? We need it to survive, and to be creative.”
Grammy award winner Danilo Perez is among the most influential and dynamic musicians of our time with his distinctive blend of Pan-American jazz. Whether leading his own ensembles or touring with renowned jazz masters including Wayne Shorter, Roy Haynes, and Steve Lacy, Danilo is making a decidedly fresh imprint on contemporary music, guided as always by his love for jazz. He has led his own groups since the early 90?s, and as bandleader has earned three Grammy nominations for his ebullient and innovative recordings.
In 2002, he received a nomination from the Jazz Journalists Association for “Pianist of the Year.” Currently, Perez serves as UNESCO Artist for Peace, Artistic Director of the Berkley Global Jazz Institute, and Artistic Director of the Panama Jazz Festival. In previous years, he served as Goodwill Ambassador to UNICEF and Cultural Ambassador to the Republic of Panama.
