Marina Silva

Deeply grounded courage and unflinching tenacity define this remarkable woman. A native Amazonian from a rubber-tapper family, Marina Silva learned how to read and write as a teen. She went on to become one of the most influential Senators in Brazil, and stood as a presidential candidate. Today, as the country’s Minister of Environment and Climate Change, she is rebuilding Brazil’s capacity to halt rampant illegal deforestation in the Amazon, a mission that has been at the center of her political and activist life. Against the odds, she is valiantly pushing for a domestic transition from centralized fossil-fuel energy to locally generated renewable energy. Internationally, she advocates that we reconsider our limited perspectives on what protecting nature can cost and instead embrace a more comprehensive understanding of the extraordinary economic impact and value that nature offers. This summer, she will champion the concept during the G-20 summit in Brazil.

Figueres, a former executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, is a co-founder of Global Optimism