At FIMI, we build ties and weave networks. We are a global mechanism that brings together organizations of Indigenous Women, leaders and activists from around the world to support their struggles and strengthen their leadership. We do this through the coordination of advocacy agendas, research and knowledge exchange, the search for and allocation of resources, among other initiatives.
Getting here was not easy. Our history goes back to 1995, at the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. In this instance, we approved and signed the Beijing Declaration of Indigenous Women, where we established the basis for our claims as Indigenous Peoples and as Women.
Five years later, with the aim of revisiting the declaration signed in Beijing, we participated in the First Indigenous Women’s Forum in New York, as part of the session of the Commission on the Status of Women, or CSW.
In 2005, now under the name of FIMI, we organized the participation of Indigenous Women from all over the world in this same session. Thanks to this work, we were able for the first time to pass a specific resolution on Indigenous Women at the CSW.
From 2008 to 2011, we raised the foundations of our house. During those years, we developed our First Strategic Plan, establishing our programs and our work methodology, based on the analysis of the opportunities, strengths and priorities of Indigenous Women at the local, national, regional and international levels.
It is also during this period that we created the Global Leadership School and its International Human Rights and Advocacy Strategies Program, as well as AYNI, the only fund run by and for us Indigenous Women. We instituted the Research and Issues of Impact on the Lives of Indigenous Women Program, and in 2011 we registered our organization legally in Lima, Peru. Thus, we managed to get FIMI registered with a notary public.
From 2012 to 2015, we embarked on a journey to support the Indigenous Women of the world and to find responses to the challenges we face from a comprehensive perspective. We established our political will to act based on consensus in the United Nations processes related to Indigenous Peoples; we resumed the implementation of the Global Leadership School; and launched the International Program on Human Rights and Advocacy Strategies. We founded the Indigenous Women’s Observatory, a tool to make visible and condemn the violation of individual and collective rights, and we launched the Leadership Award to honour the vision and creativity and to give recognition to those significant achievements at the collective level.
We have come a long way, overcoming important challenges. Although there is still a lot of work to be done, the ties we have established and the networks that we have woven are stronger than ever. Together with our allies and our donors, we share the conviction that if we join forces, we will achieve our goals. To do so, we have a solid, diverse, intergenerational team that believes that a fairer world, free of violences and discrimination, is a possible horizon.
