Call for Nominations: Equator Prize 2025 (Up To $10,000)

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About Equator Prize

The Equator Initiative, led by the United Nations, is a partnership that unites governments, civil society, grassroots organizations, and businesses to promote resilient communities through local nature-based solutions for sustainable development. It provides platforms to share knowledge, builds capacities of Indigenous peoples and local communities, informs policy through multi-stakeholder dialogues, and supports scaling up community action.

The Equator Prize 2025 will honor exceptional Indigenous and community-led initiatives advancing innovative nature-based solutions aligned with the Global Biodiversity Framework. Winners will join a prestigious network of 296 organizations from 84 countries awarded since 2002. Each recipient will receive USD 10,000 and participate in policy dialogues and special events in the fall of 2025.

Thematic priorities include:

• Nature for Climate Mitigation, Adaptation and Resilience. Actions to protect, conserve, and restore forests, mangroves, peatlands, soils, oceans, and marine ecosystems, as well as actions to build climate-resilient food systems and develop regenerative agriculture and forestry practices to adapt to climate change. These include actions to:

1. 1. Maintain intact ecosystems as they sequester better; forests, mangroves, peatlands, and soils are the greatest natural carbon stores;
   2. Uphold Indigenous Peoples’ land tenure, governance, rights, and Traditional knowledge, as they are essential to protect forests and key ecosystems;
   3. Achieve forest protection through participatory monitoring and large-scale mapping and spatial planning efforts;
   4. Recognize and allow Indigenous land defenders and local youth activists to lead initiatives for climate mitigation, justice, and build community resilience to adapt to climate change;
   5. Tackle water security, which is key for life, by protecting and restoring ecosystems critical to water resources at all levels, including continental;
   6. Transform our food systems to be more climate-resilient, less carbon-intensive, and adaptable to climate change; and
   7. Promote nature-based solutions to reduce the impacts of natural disasters, such as floods and droughts, by restoring and protecting key ecosystems.

• Nature for a Just Transition. Actions to green the economy in a way that is as fair and inclusive as possible for all members of society, including Indigenous Peoples and local communities, while creating decent work opportunities and leaving no one behind. These efforts demonstrate how solutions led at the local-level can contribute to a global value shift, including an economic and financial shift. Harnessing circular economy and reusing materials to reduce the need for resource extraction and minimize pressure on wildlife and threats to biodiversity. Shaping a nature-positive future by rethinking business as usual as an opportunity to sustainably manage and regenerate nature and catalyze low-carbon economies. These include actions to:

1. 1. Show that Indigenous Peoples and local communities can create and lead successful enterprises and bioeconomy models;
   2. Prove that effective local green solutions can reduce inequalities, improve livelihoods, enhance responsible production and consumption, and create inclusive, resilient, and low-carbon economies, while also bringing health benefits;
   3. Demonstrate that micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) and Indigenous-led economies show viable solutions to climate and opportunities for nature regeneration and economic transformation;
   4. Initiate new models of climate finance and funding mechanisms can be put in place to fund resilience, adaptation, and climate action; and
   5. Respect Indigenous Peoples’ rights as essential to building a new sustainable and thriving economy.

Special consideration will be given to nominees championing youth and women-led climate action.

Local nature-based solutions for sustainable development

The Equator Prize 2025 nomination process offers community-based initiatives the opportunity to feature their work on the Equator Initiative’s Nature-Based Solutions Database, a web portal dedicated to local nature-based solutions for sustainable development. This platform connects communities around the world and shares local solutions that benefit both people and the Planet. Participation in this platform is optional when submitting nominations for the Equator Prize.

• Sponsor Organisation: United Nations (UN)

Benefits of Equator Prize

Each Equator Prize winner will receive USD 10,000 and will be supported to participate in a series of policy dialogues and special events in the fall of 2025.

Equator Prize Requirements

To be eligible for the Equator Prize 2025:

• The initiative must have been in existence for at least three years, and/or its actions must have been implemented for at least three years.
• The nominee must be either:
  • A local community-based initiative operating in a rural area within a country receiving support from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). For a list of eligible countries, please click here
  • Or, an initiative led by Indigenous Peoples in any country, operating in a rural area.
• The nominee’s actions must be nature-based and deliver benefits that contribute to at least two Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Selection Criteria

Winners of the Equator Prize 2025 will be chosen by an independent Technical Advisory Committee, which will evaluate nominations based on the following criteria:

• Impact: The extent to which the nominated initiative has achieved measurable and positive environmental, social, and economic impacts that contribute to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs);
• Innovation: The extent to which the nominated initiative demonstrates new approaches and models that overcome prevailing constraints, and could offer fundamentally new approaches to adapting to and/or mitigating climate change, while advancing local sustainable development;
• Scalability and/or replicability: The extent to which the nominated initiative could be scaled up sub-nationally or nationally, and/or be replicated within the country and beyond;
• Resilience and Adaptability: The extent to which the nominated initiative demonstrates adaptability to environmental, social, and economic changes, and/or resilience in the face of external pressures;
• Reduced inequalities: The extent to which the initiative reduces inequalities in income as well as those related to age, sex, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion, economic or other status, with a particular focus on benefiting ;
• Social Inclusion: The extent to which the nominated initiative includes youth, Elders, Indigenous Peoples, and other diverse groups in the decision-making processes and the actions that affect them;
• Gender Equality: The extent to which the nominated initiative is led by women or ensures the equality and empowerment of women and girls.
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Application Date and Process

• Click on the link to the application website to apply. If you are having technical issues, please contact us at [email protected].

Please Note:

• Nominators are encouraged to quantify results and include data that demonstrates positive impacts in their submissions.
• Nominations may be submitted either directly by the initiative or community, by a partner organization, or by any third party that is sufficiently familiar with the activities and achievements of the initiative or community.
• Nominators must indicate whether they agree to have the solution highlighted in the Equator Initiative web portal on local nature-based solutions for sustainable development.
• Nominators must confirm whether the nominated initiative is officially registered in the country where it operates.
• Nominated initiatives will undergo a verification process that may require nominees and/or nominators to provide additional information and/or materials.
• Nominations may be submitted in English, French, Portuguese, or Spanish. To nominate in other languages (such as Arabic, Chinese, Indonesian, Russian or others), please contact the Equator Initiative for instructions at [email protected].
• Nominations must be submitted by 23 February 2025

Application Deadline

23 February, 2025

Scholarship Application Portal

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