Ambassador Spotlights: June 2023

One Young World Ambassadors are leading projects in every country of the world, creating substantial social impact across all 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Every month our Coordinating Ambassadors select someone from their region who has created significant social impact locally, regionally or even worldwide.

This Month's Featured Projects in Numbers

387 k+

people impacted

284 M

litres of water replenished

5 570 t

of waste collected

Beyond Empathy

Meet the Ambassadors

Daniel Villatoro

Guatemala

Daniel Villatoro

Daniel Villatoro is a One Young World Journalist of the Year Award winner, and the Coordinator of the Latin American LGBTI+ Journalism Initiative by the International Women’s Media Foundation, a programme that provides training and support on accurate reporting methods to surpass prejudice across the region.

 

The aim of the Initiative is to reshape the narratives in mainstream media about women and LGBTI+ people in Latin America. Since 2018, they have trained more than 400 editors from Spanish-speaking media in gender and diversity perspective through their  “Inclusive coverage: Gender perspective in the newsrooms" MOOC with the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas.

 

They have also trained 240 journalists through their “More Inclusive Journalism” programme which lasts for eight months. It covers topics such as intersectionality and editorial angles, gender perspectives and women’s stories, gender-based violence and LGBTI+ narratives. Additionally, the Initiative provides support via editorial advisory, production grants and mentorship in the development of more than 120 small media projects.

Shaniece Igano

Australia

Shaniece Igano

Shaniece is a community project worker at Beyond Empathy, an organisation that unites a team of artists, mentors, community workers, local practitioners and leaders in Australia to encourage creative expression and artistic autonomy.

Their projects help people at the individual and community levels, with the collective drawing inspiration from what the needs and aspirations of the local community where they are participating. Their current media forms are podcasts, music, photography, film and editing.

Originally a participant, Shaniece worked as an emerging leader on the feature-length animated film Protection that reached 1,882 people with 22 screenings, and in Excursions, a project that focused on First Nations storytelling and in which 78% of participants stated their imagination had been lit up through the process. For their Podcasts From the Edge, a series that mixes fiction and non-fiction stories, Shaniece has led and produced episodes with 200 participants, 1,127 sessions spanning over 2007 hours.

Shatyam Issur

Mauritius

Shatyam Issur

Shatyam is a human rights advocate focused on harm reduction and physical, social and mental wellbeing. Shatyam was the Director of the Collectif Urgence Toxida (CUT), an organisation that came about to combat the increasing rate of HIV infections with providing preventive measures & treatment for priority populations, including people who inject drugs (PWID), sex workers, the LGBTQIA+ community and people living with HIV in Mauritius.

Shatyam is a 2022 Atlantic Fellow for Health Equity, an NGO Representative with the Country Coordinating Mechanism of the Global Fund, and a member of the Long-Acting Technologies Community Advisory Board for the Treatment Action Group.

Their Needle Exchange Programme (NEP), implemented in collaboration with the Mauritian Ministry of Health, was active in 47 sites and with 12,000 beneficiaries as of 2022.They were the first organisation to implement a NEP programme in the country. For People Who Inject Drugs, they monitor 1,500 persons and distribute around 63,000 syringes and needles.

Start Americas Together team

Bolivia

Camila Olmedo Mendez

Camila is the co-founder and Executive Director of START Americas Together, a non-profit organisation, volunteering agency and creative laboratory that aims to transform good intentions into tangible impact.The organisation’s efforts take a community based approach to volunteering with local communities to create long term sustainable impact.

Their network of volunteers consists of over 350 people across six cities in four countries in Latin America and the US that in their 10-year anniversary have worked more than 11,600 hours in various socio-environmental programmes. Their initiatives cover topics ranging from early childhood education, to reforestation and climate action, and fundraising for the elderly and oncological support.

Camila also founded El Agua Es Oro, a social enterprise that provides mobile laundry and water recycling services to peri-urban communities, improving water access and resilience. The project was a winner of the Resolution Fellowship at the One Young World Summit in Bangkok, 2015, for seed funding and mentorship. Their first MVP was tested in 2020, and their goal is to reach 80,000 households.

Avinash Pratap Singh

India

Avinash Pratap Singh

Avinash is the co-founder of the Mumkin Hai Development Foundation, which aims to help the Himalayan communities in India become more socio-economically and environmentally sustainable, and is part of GiZ’ #diaspora2030 programme.

Mumkin Hai aims to work at the intersection of women and youth entrepreneurship, conservation and climate-adapted agriculture.

Avinash was also the CEO of Waste Warriors Society, a non-profit organisation that aims to improve waste management in an eco-sensitive manner within the Himalayan landscapes in northern India. Over their projects, they have collected 5,570 tonnes of waste, trained students in 350 schools, engaged with 160,000 people and helped 600 businesses develop more sustainable practices.

Kenanao Phele

Botswana

Kenanao Phele

Kenaneo co-founded and is the co-curator of the Gaborone Book Festival Trust (GBF), a non-profit organisation inspired by her love of reading. The aim of the GBF is to inspire fellow Batswana to begin reading for pleasure, regardless of their age, and to promote engagement with the work of Batswana authors and storytellers as well as from other African countries.

The Gaborone Book Festival occurs annually in September and is the only book festival in the country to date. But throughout the year, they have different activities for children and adults, including book clubs and book donations, as well as a school outreach programme.

In 2022, through the school outreach programme they conducted Read Aloud Activations reaching over 53,000 thousand students across the country. In partnership with the University of East Anglia’s School of Literature, Drama and Creative Writing, they selected 23 of Botswana’s next generation of children’s book writers and storytellers to gain in-depth training.

Gabriel Marmentini

Brazil

Gabriel Marmentini

Gabriel is the Co-founder and Executive Director of Politize!, a civil society organisation founded in 2015, that aims to raise awareness and provide information about politics and democracy with the newer generations. Politize! produces free and unbiased content of political education on the internet, trains civic leaders for being capable of solving public problems and trains teachers to educate the youth in the process to become an engaged citizen.

 

Since the beginning, Politize! has achieved 90 million unique users, 3,300 contents produced, 600,000 followers on social media, 2,500 citizen leaders trained to solve public problems, 1307 teachers trained to develop citizenship skills on 75,000 students, and won six prizes over their eight years in operation.


Gabriel was named by Forbes Brasil as part of the Under 30 2022 cohort. He is also the Co-founder and Executive Director of ACBG Brasil, a civil society organisation that supports head and neck cancer patients advocating for better policies in order to improve their quality of life and social inclusion. Finally, Gabriel holds a bachelor degree in Public Administration, a MSc degree in Administration and is about to conclude his PhD in Administration, having experiences as a professor besides his career as a social entrepreneur.

Eva Amsterdam

Netherlands

Eva Amsterdam


Eva Amsterdam is a Senior Sustainability Manager for the Netherlands at Coca Cola Euro-Pacific Partners. As part of their Sustainability Strategy, which she leads in the Netherlands, and for the water sustainability pillar, Eva and her team aim to “give back” the water used in their production process and their products by 2030.

To achieve so, they have focused on local impact given that water and drought are local issues, in their case the water catchment area of the Dutch Coca-Cola factory in Dongen. The team has invested in projects with Natuurmonumenten (Society for Preservation of Nature Monuments) to restore natural areas to hold extra water in Brabant.

Through partial financing across two years, they have replenished the Liskes with 85 million litres of water per year, and the Pastoorswijer with 57 million litres of water per year.

Uche Kenneth Udekwe

Nigeria

Uche Kenneth Udekwe

Uche founded Natal Cares, a social enterprise that leverages the power of mobile technology, machine learning, and low cost innovation to combat maternal and infant mortality in Nigeria.

In order to bridge the healthcare information gap existing in underserved communities, Natal Cares delivers valuable healthcare information using SMS and voice notes in six local languages. These personalised weekly texts/voice-notes remind expectant mothers of pregnancy follow-ups, clinical-reminders, child-growth and nutrition, symptoms of common childhood-illnesses, antenatal and postnatal care tips.

Through this service, Natal Cares ensures that its subscribers have access to the critical health and nutritional information they need to assist with a healthy pregnancy. So far, Natal Cares has helped more than 45,000 women across 52 rural communities in Nigeria, trained 500 midwives on delivery practices to develop their skills, and economically empowered 30 women that work as community agents with them.

Daniela Saez

Chile

Daniela Saez

Daniela Saez is an electronic engineer and STEAM activist. Her work is inspired by her experience growing up as a girl interested in science and discrimination she faced because of it. Daniela wants to break down the gender gap in STEAM, motivate women to join the STEAM world and push for diversity in her field.

Daniela provides workshops and talks on the topic of women empowerment and integration in STAEM, reaching an audience of over 1,000 people. Daniela is an ambassador for INGENIOSAS in Chile whose objective is to communicate, promote and highlight the work of women in STEAM. In addition, Daniela is a volunteer for several organizations that want to change this, and she has received awards on various occasions.