BE30

‘You can only solve the great issues in the world together with the people directly involved in them’

Sjef Langeveld in 2020

Sjef Langeveld was the director of Both ENDS from the end of 1999 to the end of May 2008. He looks back on an eventful decade, in which Both ENDS slowly came of age. Start from the strengths that are already there, that was and is Sjef Langeveld’s motto: ‘I took the gold in the organisation as my starting point.’

Sjef, you came straight into Both ENDS as director, and were also new at that time in the sector of international cooperation. What did you know about Both ENDS and what appealed to you about the job?

That’s right, I had a background as landscape architect, urban and rural planner, ecologist and researcher within the Netherlands. I had always had the ambition and motivation to work internationally. I didn’t become involved in international projects until I went to work at Wageningen University.

I didn’t know Both ENDS, but when I heard that they were looking for a director, I contacted them and they asked me to come in to talk about it. Then I knew immediately that the job fitted me like a glove.

It was what I really wanted to do. I wanted to work on issues relating to water and land for the people – farmers, citizens and local residents – who use them every day. That was exactly what Both ENDS did, and still does. You can only solve the great issues in the world together with the people directly involved in them. You have to take their rights and their energy as your starting point.

What kind of organisation was Both ENDS when you started as director? What did you need to start working on straight off?

I wanted Both ENDS to be recognised as an organisation that mattered, that legitimation was very important to me. That appreciation was already there, of course. I saw that as soon as I walked in the door. I call that ‘the gold of Both ENDS’, but there was no certainty. So that’s where I started: securing the basic funding with the help of Cordaid, paying people a decent salary, and generating recognition from the outside world.

When were asked in 2002 whether we wanted to take over Inzet, the international organisation of the Dutch Labour Party (PvdA), that was confirmation for me that we were on the right track. Both ENDS was appreciated for its work and that brought financial security. We obtained more funding from the Ministries of Environment and Foreign Affairs.

Besides that recognition for Both ENDS within the Netherlands, what was for you the most interesting aspect of the organisation’s work in your period as director? Where was that ‘gold’?

I found the Drynet programme very interesting. We started it back then, first in the Sahel and then expanding it to other regions. Is that still going?

Yes, it’s now a CSO network, with the secretariat in South Africa.

So that was a success, excellent! It was a fundamental response to degradation: stopping degradation by reforestation, using the land differently, starting with local residents themselves. I thought the Negotiated Approach was very exciting, too, but that was already in place. Drynet was really new.

What I also found very interesting was forest garden products. That was a joint programme with Cordaid that enabled the products of ‘forest dwellers’ to be marketed in Europe. And the Joke Waller-Hunter Initiative, set up with Joke’s estate, is also very special. I never met her myself but she was very important to Both ENDS from the beginning.

After Joke’s death, the executor of her will asked me to take responsibility for her estate. She had left instructions for the money to be devoted to develop international leadership among young people working for NGOs. I immediately told Irene Dankelman [who was a board member at that time, ed.] and, when I got back to the office, she was there with all our colleagues. I told everyone about Joke’s wishes, and they were all very moved. For a moment, it seemd like Joke was there is the room with us. It was very special.

Langeveld pauses, lost in though. Then:

If you look at the varied patchwork of Both ENDS’ work, you wonder where the consistency comes from. But if you have a patchwork, you have all the stitches that hold it together. Those stitches are our basic values. Human rights and the environment, linked, joined together.

But if you ask me what the most important parts of our work were from that period… I want you to mention, besides Drynet, the Negotiated Approach.

What is so special about the Negotiated Approach?

It’s about the value of water, the involvement of local residents in how that water is managed, and the guarantee that they are in control. But that is extremely difficult! It is their water and their concern and their resource but it is distributed, with dams and irrigation, to the benefit of those in power.

We had a project with seven river basins around the world, and everywhere they were trying to give people control over their water. After everything I had experienced in the Netherlands, with how water was managed and the changes in the Dutch water sector, the mergers of the small water authorities into a few very large ones, I found that very strange. With all my water experience in the Netherlands, I couldn’t understand why we were increasing the distance between residents and their water here, while in the seven regions in the project the movement was in the opposite direction.

To conclude the project, all the partners came to the Netherlands and I arranged a visit to the water authority and dyke warden at Alblasserwaard. When our bus arrived at the water authority offices, the dyke warden opened the doors and told us that the offices were empty. The authority had been incorporated into a larger one. The water authority that I wanted to show the visitors, how it was set up, with an entrance for the local residents and so on – it was all gone!

On the way back, Vijay Paranjpye [from India, one of the founders of the Negotiated Approach, ed.] said ‘We have made a big mistake in this project. We should have included the Rhine basin in it. The management has been handed over to a large bureaucratic body. You could have learned a lot from us!’ He had a good point there.

Working together with the people who are directly involved: that’s how you approached your work at Both ENDS, but it also applies to Markdal, where you live and have been involved in for a number of years now. I see a close similarity there to the Negotiated Approach.

Yes, there is, isn’t there? And that’s very necessary in this country. Degradation is just as bad here as everywhere else. The soil is over-fertilised and depleted, biodiversity has decreased alarmingly. That overloading of the original system is apparent all around the world. In the Markdal, we want to create a natural environment, allow the river to flow freely and lush vegetation to return, so that biodiversity increases again.

Sjef Langeveld with the project manager of the municipality in Markdal. Still from video by OMOOC, 2017

You have seen solutions all around the world for degraded catchment basins and to combat soil degradation. Did you learn lessons at Both ENDS that you can now apply in Markdal?

Yes, the solution lies with those who are responsible for the land, who use it and extract water from it. At Markdal, we’ve made a deal with the provincial authorities: let us, as residents and land-owners, strengthen the natural environment ourselves and get the river flowing freely again, within the limits set by your administrative aims. We discovered that local farmers wanted the same. Then you’ll find a solution together on how to do that. There are no standard ways of approaching it. It’s a matter of trial and error, and the Negotiated Approach is a good guiding framework.

The strategy you choose can then be repeated over and again: people trust each other, give each other space. But there can still be problems, such as language. The farmers are tired of the way they are spoken to and about. The provincial authorities say ‘bottom up’ instead of ‘from within’, and an ‘area-based process’ rather than ‘a society-based process’. If you speak of ‘bottom up’, that means that the farmers and residents are at the bottom of the ladder. And in our work, society is the base, we start from the original value that that area has. From within.

You still follow Both ENDS closely. Where do you feel our legitimacy lies? Where is our gold these days?

That you show solidarity, that you provide a strong helping hand for others that need it. Standing shoulder to shoulder is important. We have the advantage of a good social context here. That gives us a responsibility to show solidarity with people in other parts of the world who are grappling with the same challenges that we face. Then you’ll see that they do the same for us. That reciprocity is at the core of the fight for human rights and for the environment.

Julius Mbatia

Julius Mbatia is one of the more than 300 young environmental leaders from Asia, Africa and Latin America that received support from the Joke Waller Hunter Initiative (JWHI). For our 30 year anniversary, we talked to this inspiring young Kenyan about the present and future of local and international climate policy, environmental policy and human rights.

At just 27 years old, Mbatia’s accomplishments include co-founding the Youth for Sustainable Development Goals Kenya, coordinating the climate finance work of the Pan-African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA) and leading the establishment of devolved climate finance institutions at local community level. He has represented African CSOs in numerous Green Climate Fund (GCF) meetings, serves on the Steering Committee of GCF Watch and represents developing country civil society organizations as an Alternate Active Observer to the GCF. In addition, he works as a policy advocacy officer at an African think tank based in Kenya. He is now using his grant to obtain a Master’s degree in Environmental Planning and Management at the University of Nairobi, where he plans to conduct research on climate change governance that supports action at the local level.

Another leadership needed for structural transformation

As Mbatia sees it, the grim realities facing the world call upon us to rethink leadership and governance. Countries in the global South continue to barrel down a development pathway that replicates the trajectory of the global North and doesn’t serve the majority of the population: ‘If you look at Kenya, only a small proportion of the population benefits from our economic growth and our natural resources,’ says Mbatia. ‘Just about 10% of the population controls the wealth of the nation, so you can imagine what is happening to the 90%. Our systems and structures are not speaking to the present challenge of inclusive and sustainable development. We need to ask ourselves what kind of leadership can bring about the structural transformation we need.’

Mbatia sees the need to forge connections and better decision-making across economic, social and environmental spheres in Kenya. He points out that ‘most of the damage to the environment is made as a result of decisions outside the environmental sector’. Addressing this discrepancy is one of the motivations behind his academic work. He hopes to come out of his master’s programme with increased knowledge for analysing the politics of development and for centrally placing the environment within that politics.

Julius Mbatia in action during youth consultation on National Climate Change Action Plan development in Nairobi

Julius Mbatia at the Fridays for Future Climate March in Germany, June 2019, during the UNFCCC SB 50

The youth climate movement

When asked about the importance of young leadership, Mbatia underscores the importance of inclusive decision-making generally. He highlights the fact that he speaks not just as a young person, but as someone who has ‘done his homework’ and formed his own analysis. That said, he does think that young people are more aware of – and more interested in – the shifts that are already happening and those that need to happen. ‘I have the ambition of being part of a generation that is more responsible, more inspired and more fulfilled. That is the change that I want to bring to the table.’

In recent years, young people’s climate activism has received significant political and public attention, including from world leaders. For Mbatia, the challenge ahead is to ensure that young people get a role in decision-making. ‘At COP 25, the 2019 UN climate talks, we had youth movements from around the globe calling for a different world. We showed the power young people have,’ says Mbatia. ‘But it’s not enough for policymakers to mention young people or give them a stage. They have to pull back and create processes to allow young people – those who are demanding climate justice and climate action – to be part of the solution. That would mean, for example, giving young people access to climate finance to deliver tangible and practical action with transformational potential. There are more spaces being created for youth, such as in UN committees, but it is important to give them the technical support for that role.’

Both ENDS: connecting young leaders for “crazy potential”

Mbatia applauds the work of Both ENDS and the Joke Waller Hunter Initiative to that end. ‘Joke Waller Hunter had a vision of young people who are not just supported, but who make a difference in the world. Providing influential young people with practical support and investing resources in them is really important.’

With an eye to the future, Mbatia hopes to see Both ENDS step up its support for young people’s movements. Daan Robben, who coordinates the Joke Waller Hunter Initiative, shares this aim. Robben is working on developing a community platform for past and present JWHI grantees. Recent activities include webinars with experts. ‘We know youth are important but they are often in that back of our minds. We have a beautiful young leadership programme, but I think we can do a much better job connecting it to our other programmes.’

Julius Mbatia sees a role for Both ENDS that goes beyond supporting young leaders’ education and other immediate capacity building needs. ‘Through the Joke Waller Hunter Initiative, Both ENDS has a big opportunity to strengthen connections among the world’s young environmental leaders. Together, we have crazy potential to make a difference.’

About Joke Waller-Hunter

The legacy of Joke Waller-Hunter is colossal. She was not only a key figure in the founding of Both ENDS, but a world leader in sustainable development. Following her important work at the Dutch Ministry of Environment, she became the first UN Director for the UN Commission on Sustainable Development in 1994. She went on to become Director of the OECD Environment Directorate and subsequently Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), where she oversaw the coming into force of the Kyoto Protocol. Waller-Hunter died prematurely in 2005, but not before arranging to pass the torch of sustainable development to a younger generation. She bequeathed her estate to Both ENDS for the purpose of fostering leadership development, education and expertise among tomorrow’s environmental activists.

Since 2007 the Joke Waller Hunter Initiative (JWHI) has supported more than 300 young environmental leaders form the global South to pursue academic studies, internships and trainings that advance their professional goals.

 

Joke Waller-Hunter (center), UNFCCC’s Executive Secretary at COP10 in 2004. Photo by IISD

 

We’ve asked you, our partners, friends, allies from around the world to share with us your dearest memories of our cooperation, and your wishes for the years to come. Below you find a selection of responses. Thank you all for your contributions! Without you, our network, we wouldn’t be able to reach our goals.

Solange Ikeda, Brazil
GAIA Institute:

“In 2012, Both ENDS got to know our fight and they are always on our side. In 2014, we were together at an event of the Pantanal Network and at the Day of the River Paraguay in Caceres, Brazil. During an expedition of the Pantanal Network through the waters of the Paraguay River to the Taiamã Ecological Station in 2014, we discussed the need to join efforts for the conservation of the Pantanal. 

 

Both ENDS people have gained our friendship and trust. Currently we work together in the Wetlands without Borders Program. We at the Gaia Institute hope to always be together in defense of the Pantanal and the wetlands!”

Tamara Mohr of Both ENDS, speaking at the Ecological Station of Taiamã, Pantanal, Brazil

Ana di Pangracio, Argentina
Fundación Ambiente y Recursos Naturales (FARN):

“I personally have been collaborating with Both ENDS for 10 years for my work at the Fundación Ambiente y Recursos Naturales (FARN). What I value the most about Both ENDS is their great ability to listen, to respect our work and work history, to speak to us in our language, and help our organizations to continue developing our tasks and strengthening them. And I especially highlight not only the professional but also the human quality of all of its staff, it is something that all employees of Both ENDS have in common.”

Thanks to Both ENDS’s support through the Wetlands without Borders program, Ana participated in the CBD Women Caucus in with the aim to integrate a gender perspective into global and national biodiversity policies. Photo by Ana di Pangracio.

Ron Rosenhart and Wout Albers, the Netherlands
Global Justice Association:

“We think that Both ENDS has a lot of added value! Thank you for working with us in the Berta Caceres case.”

Annemarie Schaapveld, the Netherlands
Former employee of Both ENDS:

“I have been working at Both ENDS in 2011 and my dearest memories consist of learning so much about your amazing work, organizing teambuilding activities in Haarlem and diners with “friends of Both ENDS”. The reason for this was celebrating the 20th anniversary of Both ENDS, so its already 10 years ago! I have also spend many hours in the archive room, to sort things out :-). Worked together closely with Anne-Roos, who supported me in many ways.”

Bianca Nijhof, the Netherlands
Netherlands Water Partnership (NWP):

“Both ENDS is a very active and passionate organisation in the water sector. They are a highly valued member of the Netherlands Water Partnership (NWP). Their participation is visible in many ways, their director is representing the NGO’s in the NWP Board. And as part of the NGO Platform of NWP, Both ENDS not only discusses on the cutting edge, but is also reaching out to other NWP members as well. In other words, they can be critical, but in a more and more constructive way.

Each and every one of the staff members of Both ENDS NWP has worked and is working with, is really devoted. It is impressive and inspiring to see this devotion. And this devotion is needed, as we are in many ways not there yet.

Congratulations Both ENDS with your 30th anniversary. Looking forward to our continued collaboration.”

Lydia Mkandawire, Malawi
Centre for Human Rights and Rehabilitation:

Pieter Lammers with his family in 2019

Pieter Lammers was development cooperation policy officer in the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the time Both ENDS was founded. He has been one of those people that was crucial for the development of Both ENDS during ‘the early years’, as he supported our view on equal partnerships with Southern actors and on the importance of sustainability. For Both ENDS’s anniversary, he looks back on the context of development cooperation in those early years.

‘At that time environment was not at all an issue in the development conversation,’ explains Lammers. ‘There was a very small unit on energy, with two of us, but not much happened for the first couple of years. The Ministry was not really interested in environmental issues. There was one ecologist in the whole Ministry.’

Environment and development

Yet awareness was growing. Lammers describes two emerging trends, both of which were critical to the founding of Both ENDS and ultimately reshaped the field: increased recognition of the need for sustainable development and the autonomous power of Southern civil society. In October of 1987, the UN published Our Common Future, also known as the Brundtland Report, which helped introduce environmental issues into the global development agenda. From Lammers’s vantage point, the parliamentary election of 1989 and the appointment of Jan Pronk as Minister for Development Co-operation marked the turning point. Pronk proclaimed sustainable development a top priority, and gave Lammers and his environmentally-minded colleagues a key role in developing Ministry policy. Lammers was responsible for writing the sustainable development chapter of the Ministry’s new policy paper, where he brought the economic, social and environmental issues together into one conceptual framework.

The policy paper, Een Wereld van Verschil (A World of Difference), was finalised in 1990. ‘The Minister wanted to stress that things were going to be very, very different,’ says Lammers. At the global level, the Netherlands and a handful of other countries played a major role in pushing forward the sustainable development and climate agenda. ‘We had very good cooperation with the Ministry of Environment,’ says Lammers. ‘Fritz Schlingeman, Joke Waller [who later left her legacy to Both ENDS to found the JWH initiative, ed.] and a few other people – we closely cooperated in bringing the sustainable development agenda forward.’

The new policy led to a reorganisation of the Ministry and the creation of a new – and very well-funded – programme on environment and development. With palpable delight, Lammers recalls: ‘We went from being a very small unit with nearly nothing to being a very large organisation with lots of resources.’ It was during these same years that IUCN staff came to the Ministry with a proposal for Both ENDS, which was first funded by the Ministry as an IUCN project and subsequently as an independent organisation.

Strong civil society

Alongside the new focus on sustainable development was a shift in understanding about the role of civil society in the South. ‘There was a growing understanding that there could be no sustainable development, there could be no development at all, if you don’t have a strong civil society. There was a growing realisation that the classical, top-down model of development aid was not really the way to work together,’ Lammers explains. ‘NGOs in the South really came into the picture – not as before, not as ‘implementers’ of Dutch development aid policy – but as independent, autonomous NGOs. You need equality and a certain amount of reciprocity in order to be sustainable and effective. That’s where Both ENDS came in. The name says it: linking organisations in North and South that are working on the same issues and see how they can help each other.’

Sustainability agreements: reciprocity, equality and participation

Lammers played a leading role, along with Both ENDS and many others, in a groundbreaking initiative that tied together the new approaches to development and Southern civil society. Following the landmark UN Conference on Environment and Development in Rio in 1992, more than 175 countries signed on to the Rio Declaration, which laid out the principles and path for sustainable development. Lammers and colleagues in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Environment were eager to put the Declaration in practice: ‘We wanted to find a way and a scale to make the Rio Declaration work.’ With the backing of both Ministers, an innovative cooperative process to develop reciprocal, sustainable agreements was launched. The process involved the Netherlands and three similarly small and environmentally-committed countries in each region of the South: Costa Rica, Benin and Bhutan.

‘The principles of the relationship were reciprocity, equality and participation. The participation part was very important. That’s where Both ENDS played a major role.’ The initiative began by inverting the traditional North to South approach to development aid: a Bhutanese delegation visited the Netherlands to reflect and comment on sustainability issues in the Netherlands. More exchanges followed, with Both ENDS playing a key role in ensuring participation by a wide range of civil society actors in the participating countries. The idea was to bring together a variety of people and perspectives, including government representatives, NGOs, labour unions, police, commercial organisations.

‘The approach was a complete departure from the classical development paradigm, which essentially promoted replication of the Netherlands’ historical path to development’, explains Lammers. The sustainable development paradigm, which defined the collaboration, was built on the understanding that the Netherlands, no less than Costa Rica, Benin and Bhutan, had to follow its own unique path in order to reach a common place of sustainable development. ‘The Netherlands is extremely ecologically unsustainable, while Bhutan is one of the only countries in the world that absorbs more carbon than it emits. You can’t copy each other, which means you needs a lot of dialogue and discussion. And that’s what we did.’

Pieter Lammers with his colleague Chris Enthoven, the Bhutan coordinator at Ecooperation, the agency responsible for the Sustainability Agreements. They are visiting the king of Bhutan, who has been cut off the picture because it’s inapproriate to spread his image. Bhutan, 1994. Photo: Pieter Lammers

Women on their way to a festival, Bhutan, date unknown. Photo: Pieter Lammers

 

Lammers describes Both ENDS as ‘instrumental in forging bonds with organisations’ in the countries involved. Both ENDS took part in all the visits and a staff person was assigned as a contact in each of the countries. ‘Twenty years later I still meet people in Bhutan who talk about how much the sustainable development agreements meant to them and to their organisations. It was an exciting time,’ states Lammers. Ultimately, the political winds shifted and when the agreements were formalised into treaties, complications arose. Decision-making was shifted to the embassies and, in Lammers’s analysis, created a heavy layer of bureaucracy that had not previously existed. ‘Instead of being a description of our relationship, it became a prescription. It became so solidified and we needed to keep things fluid.’

Southern civil society should play an independent role

Both ENDS’s approach – based on equality and respect for partners’ autonomy and expertise – was unique at the time. Most Dutch development aid was channelled through a handful of Dutch organisations with offices in Southern countries. In 2001, Lammers authored another influential report, ‘Civil Society and Structural Poverty Reduction’ which emphasised the importance of equality and independence of civil society organisations in the South. ‘The idea was that if you want civil society in, for example, Africa, to play their independent role, just like civil society in the Netherlands does, then they should be independent and equal partners to Dutch development organisations and the Dutch government. They should be able to pursue their own agendas.’ The report’s conclusions, which were strongly supported by Both ENDS, further articulated the new vision for international cooperation. Soon after, in 2004, Lammers left the Ministry. He was disappointed that the report’s recommendations weren’t taken up by the time he departed. ‘Everyone agreed, but nothing happened,’ he says with a chuckle.

Fortunately, the story does not end there. In 2015 all United Nations Member States adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, ‘the shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future’. Sustainability and development are solidly fused together. Likewise, the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs now invests significant resources in strengthening the lobbying and advocacy capacity of civil society in the South. Its current funding framework places particular emphasis on local ownership and equality in relationships between organisations in North and South. Both ENDS participates in two consortia, the Fair, Green and Global Alliance (FGG) and the Global Alliance for Green and Gender Action (GAGGA) respectively, which were selected by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs as strategic partners for the coming five years. Where Both ENDS is the leading organisation in the FGG Alliance, GAGGA is being led by a southern organisation, the Fondo Centroamericano de Mujeres (FCAM, Central-American Women’s Fund), based in Nicaragua.

Pieter Lammers can only appreciate this shift of power. “Civil Society Organisations anywhere should be able to act independently and autonomously from governments, and relationships between CSO’s in North and South should become ever more horizontal, equal and reciprocal. Both ENDS is an important actor in this development.”

Pieter Lammers speeching at a Milieudefensie protest, between 1975-1980

About Pieter Lammers

Pieter Lammers began his career in international development cooperation at the FAO in Rome, where he worked in the early 1970s in lieu of military service. When he returned to the Netherlands in 1975, he worked on energy issues at Milieudefensie. In the 1980s he worked as campaign manager on acid rain for Friends of the Earth International and staffed its International Secretariat. In his spare time, Lammers was active in the movement against nuclear power. In 1987 Lammers became a development cooperation policy officer in the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a position he held during the founding of Both ENDS. He left the Ministry in 2004 to become an independent consultant and later a tour guide in Bhutan and other Asian countries.

Irene Dankelman

Irene Dankelman was Both ENDS’s first project coordinator when Both ENDS started as a project of IUCN NL. She is now a member of the Advisory board of our JWH Initiative. Irene told us about those early days when she started researching and writing about women and the environment, and about how Both ENDS put this topic on the agenda.

Both ENDS originated from a book you wrote in 1988 called ‘Women and the Environment in the Third World: Alliance for the Future.’ How did a book give birth to an organisation?

In the early 1980s, I was working as the coordinator of IUCN Netherlands in Amsterdam. We had many working groups on international issues in which the Netherlands played a role, such as Tropical Forests, World Conservation Strategy, Antarctica, and North Sea.

In 1985 the Chair of IUCN-NL suggested I work for a while at the Environment Liaison Centre International, in Nairobi, in order to help them organise a series of workshops on women and the environment at the UN Women’s Conference that was being planned there. It was really my first encounter with the work and role of women in the context of the environment. Although, as one of the only women working on environment and development issues in the Netherlands, I had personally experienced how difficult it is in a male dominated sector to have your voice heard and respected.

You didn’t have a background in women and the environment?

I was trained as an ecologist. Up until the late 1970s, it was unusual to link the issues of environment and development, let alone gender and the environment. The issues were all in separate silos. However, there was some eagerness to learn about the links from a professional and policy perspective. The Environment and Development Working Group, in which I participated, worked to push the relationships between environment and development issues to the fore. But the workshop series at the 1985 UN Women’s Conference was really the first time that we took a serious look at the intersection of environment, women’s positions and international development, and brought it into the agenda of the conference.

Irene (far right) at the UN Women’s Conference in Nairobi, 1985. © Irene Dankelman

The 1985 UN Women’s Conference was really the first time that we took a serious look at the intersection of environment, women’s positions and international development. © Irene Dankelman

What did you do at the Conference?

We brought together young women leaders from all regions of the world who were putting the role of women in environmental management and resource use at the forefront. It was amazing. The participants included women like Vandana Shiva and Wangari Maathai. At that time they were just starting their work. Only later were they really recognised as global environmental leaders.

I knew we had to collect and share the life stories and work stories of these women and the movements behind them. With support from the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, I teamed up with Joan Davidson to write and publish the book, under the auspices of an IUCN-Netherlands project. That’s one half of the story leading up to the founding of Both ENDS.

The other half is that IUCN-NL was asked to find out what environmental organisations in the global South were doing and to see how their work could be supported. The research, done by my colleague Harry van der Wulp, was an inventory of organisations in the South working on environmental issues. In the process of writing the book and the report, we had built a great network and identified priorities and needs from our colleagues around the world. We thought: let’s bring it together into a special project to support organisations in the global South when they need information or funding or support for their advocacy and lobbying.

Eventually the project became an independent organisation, with support from both the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of the Environment. People like Joke Waller-Hunter,* who worked in the Ministry of Environment at the time, really saw the importance of this work and an organisation dedicated to it. Support for women and their efforts was an explicit part of the project. It was part of Both ENDS’s original mandate.

In your book, you say that ‘to restore and conserve the environment a worldwide reorientation of development towards sustainability is needed at all levels of society’ and that ‘women are among the most important and best experienced actors’ in this regard. It seems this should be obvious by now. Yet we still have to say it today. What do you think has changed since you wrote these words?

Well, at the time, the voices of women weren’t so loud yet. They were there at the local level very strongly, but ignored or invisible at national, regional and international levels. With the book, Joan and I wanted to show that women are actors and have expertise. They are affected by environmental issues in different ways. But they are not just vulnerable, they are not just victims. This is still very relevant. We still tend to start with women’s vulnerabilities, instead of their capabilities.

At that time there was no podium and few voices saying this. Nowadays, there are thousands of voices telling us we have to look at the grassroots, at women. You have to look at the reality of people’s lives, where policies impact them. There is much more noise around these issues, many more words and policies. But still, making it happen on the ground is a challenge.

Another thing that is different now from the 70s and 80s is the level of analysis. Now, we look much more into the context. We’re asking questions like why is there more violence against women when environmental justice is at stake. And there is much more attention to the systems in which and with which we live. The call for transformational change is much stronger.

There is also more focus on an intersectional approach. That was completely absent in those days. We were happy if we could even focus on the role of women and men! What I’ve learned is that working with a gender lens also allows you to look into other social dimensions that are relevant in people’s lives – class, age and ethnicity, for example.

And another thing that’s different: there are millions of women and men, especially young people, calling for environmental justice and women’s rights. There is far more knowledge and expertise. There are now libraries full of information on these issues.

Irene working on her book in the IUCN NL office, around 1988. © Irene Dankelman

Was there resistance along the way?

I felt that, especially in the Netherlands, there was not much willingness among environmental organisations to bring the gender aspect to the forefront. It was not seen as relevant. The thinking was: we have too much work to do on the environment, let’s not waste our time with gender. That has also changed a lot. Now almost every environmental and development organisation has taken up gender and social issues.

In 2005, you supported Both ENDS in developing its first gender policy. What led up to that?

I was a board member around that time. It seemed that the issue of gender had become a bit side-lined within Both ENDS. Even though good work on gender was being done – there were some great people working on it and there was collaboration with women’s organisations – it was not so well defined or explicit in the organisation. Maybe it lacked some coherence and attention.

One lesson we’ve learned is that organisations really need a clear mandate to embed gender justice in their work, and they need people to drive the work. For a period of time that was perhaps a bit lacking at Both ENDS. The gender policy helped make the work more systematic.

It seems that the next big milestone in Both ENDS’s history on ‘women and the environment’ was the inception of the Global Alliance for Green and Gender Action (GAGGA), in 2015.

Yes, Both ENDS’s participation in GAGGA brought all these lines together. I am now involved in the external review of the final evaluation of GAGGA. It’s clear that the programme has strengthened the work on the intersection of women’s rights and environmental justice on many different levels. There are so many lessons on the ground from the GAGGA programme. And Both ENDS and the other GAGGA organisations, FCAM and Mama Cash and their partners, have learned so much from each other.

There is also clearer recognition of how important resources are – both information and financial resources –for women’s and other grassroots organisations to be able to do their work. GAGGA really underscores the importance of an intersectional approach. I see this first GAGGA programme as a starting point and I am so happy that it will continue.**

We are in the midst of a global environmental crisis and a global pandemic. We know that the lives of women are being severely impacted. What is the role of Both ENDS in facing these challenges and looking to the future?

Both ENDS must continue being a critical watchdog and supporter of environmental justice and human rights…for at least thirty more years! It is essential that the lobbying and advocacy work with partners in the global South continues. That’s why GAGGA is so important. It is so important to continue bringing people’s voices – women’s voices – to the forefront, and ensure that they are being heard.

Village meeting on local water management in Gogalwadi, Maharashtra state, India. Women and men held their meeting seperately. Date unknown

Sengwer women discuss the building of the Cultural Centre, Embobut, Kenya. Also in the 20th century, it is still necessary to organise women-only spaces.*** © Milka Chepkorir

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*In 1994 Joke Waller-Hunter became the first UN Director for the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development. She eventually became Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. Waller-Hunter passed away in 2005, leaving her estate to Both ENDS. With her legacy, Both ENDS created the Joke Waller-Hunter Initiative, which supports education, experience and training for young environmental leaders in developing countries.

**The GAGGA Alliance was recently awarded a second five-year strategic partnership with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2021-2025.

***Also see the publication “Embedding gender justice in environmental action: where to start?“, Both ENDS 2020.

In 1986, representatives from 15 Dutch environmental organisations met to discuss the daily reality that thousands of nature- and environmental organisations in developing countries have to cope with. All these organisations contribute to the wellbeing of people and their natural environment in their own way: preventing roads from being built in endangered rain forests or protecting coral reefs in valuable fishing waters. These organisations often operate within a context of political repression and lack information, contacts and financial, political and moral support.

In reaction to this serious issue, Dutch environmental organisations created Both ENDS: Environment and Development Service. The former IUCN-ledencontact (now IUCN Netherlands) adopted Both ENDS as a project. The project’s goal was to offer support and guidance to organisations around the world. It also wanted to find a way to bring the worlds of development cooperation and environmental protection together. By 1990 Both ENDS was strong enough to continue its mission as an independent foundation. We were registered officially on December 20, 1990.

Supporting civil society

Since 1986, Both ENDS has supported many hundreds of environmental organisations in Africa, Asia, Latin America and countries in Central- and Eastern Europe. We have offered help in fundraising, in creating networks in and outside the Netherlands and in collecting relevant information. We also brought concerns of groups of people in developing countries to the attention of policymakers and the corporate world on a local, national and international level.

Together with local organisations we have initiated programs that were specifically focused on the sustainable management and protection of river basins, forests, wetlands and dry areas.

Dialogue with decision makers

In its efforts to connect people for change Both ENDS’ experience confirmed that sustainable and inclusive development is only possible within an economic system that takes social and environmental values into account. So next to supporting civil society and promoting sustainable practices, civil society participation in policy dialogue is important as well.

To that end Both ENDS regularly organized seminars, expert meetings and ‘political cafes’ with members of the Dutch Parliament, decision makers in public institutions and companies, scientists and other civil society organisations. Both ENDS became a trusted dialogue partner to many institutions in both the Netherlands and at the international level.

Both ENDS in the 2020s

Developments in information technology over the past decades have changed our way of working with partners. Partners have access to a lot more information than they had in the 1990’s, so their asks to Both ENDS have changed accordingly. We are no longer a “service desk” for civil society organisations in the Global South, but rather a sparring partner and information broker in a wide range of formal and informal networks. Together we defend civic space, advocate for fair and sustainable international economic relations and encourage transformative practices that reinforce the livelihoods of local communities.