Xoli Fuyani established Black Girls Rising to empower young black girls in Cape Town to become climate champions in their own communities. The mentoring program now extends across South Africa and beyond.

What inspired you to start Black Girls Rising?

I’m from Gugulethu, one of the very first migrant townships in Cape Town. Looking back, what was different between me and the children growing up in the same neighborhood is that I was surrounded by a family that loved being in nature. When I got older, I realized that that was not the case for everyone. In my late teens, I got an opportunity to go to a multiracial school, which was outside my community. I think it was the first time I was really struck by the disparities that existed in Cape Town. For example, on the drive to my school, there were a lot of green spaces, tall trees. Even my schoolyard had an abundance of greenery around it, versus my community where it was mainly informal settlements, dump sites, blocked drains – no trees at all… That really inspired me to find ways to bring nature into spaces where the environments were very vulnerable. That’s why I ended up studying environmental education.

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