By Bryan Ludeña
After a week of advocacy, dialogue, and strategic meetings in New York, the Amazon Sacred Headwaters Alliance concluded its participation in Climate Week NYC 2026 by positioning proposals developed from Indigenous territories and opening new opportunities for collaboration and financing to protect the Amazon.
Amazonía / New York, september 2026. The Amazon Sacred Headwaters Alliance (ASHA) concluded its participation in Climate Week NYC 2026, following an agenda that brought to international spaces a vision for climate action built from the Amazon and its peoples.
Its participation reinforced the message ASHA brought to New York: the Amazon is not only a territory in need of protection; it is also a territory that generates solutions to the climate crisis.
Amazonian proposals in new spaces
Amazon Sacred Headwaters’ participation began with a series of meetings aimed at connecting territorial solutions with actors from climate finance, international cooperation, and the private sector.
At Breaking Down and Breaking Through, organized by the Collaborative for Systemic Climate Action, ASHA shared lessons learned from its collective work, the Bioregional Plan, and its financing proposal, creating opportunities for engagement with potential funders.
During the Bioeconomy Showcase & Live Matchmaking Experience, organized by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the Alliance presented its proposal to funders and companies interested in connecting with initiatives developed from Indigenous territories across the Sacred Headwaters region.
At the Water & Environmental Value session, hosted by Ernst & Young LLP (EY) United States, ASHA brought a fundamental position to the discussion: water cannot be understood solely in terms of its economic value. The intervention opened new conversations with actors involved in climate finance and climate action.
The Alliance also participated in The Earth Has a Song, an event organized by Daughters for Earth and Vital Voices, where Sacred Headwaters’ work was presented to an audience of allies and potential funders.
From Indigenous leadership to new partnerships
Uno de los espacios estratégicos de la semana fue «Rooted in Partnership: Advancing Climate Resilience Through Indigenous Leadership», organizado por Aveda con la facilitación de Forest Guardians Invest.
During the event, ASHA presented its territorial work and held conversations with representatives from Aveda, a company that maintains a collaborative relationship with the Yawanawa people of Brazil.
Likewise, at Territorial Economies in Action, organized together with Community-Led Forest Economies, GATC, UNDP, RRI, AIC, and WRI, the Alliance presented its work to stakeholders involved in public policy, conservation, territorial economies, and finance.
These spaces helped reinforce one of Sacred Headwaters’ central messages: the climate transition must strengthen economies that sustain life, forests, and communities, rather than reproduce extractive models that turn new territories into sacrifice zones.
The voice of the Amazon at the United Nations
Amazon Sacred Headwaters’ agenda also reached UNGA 81.
During The New Media Frontier: Storytelling, AI & Impact @ UNGA, Atossa Soltani and Zenaida Yasacama participated in an event organized by the PVBLIC Foundation, where Zenaida delivered a message from the Amazon about the importance of maintaining international attention on the region and recognizing the role of its peoples in protecting it.
Later, at the SDG Media Zone: Beyond Awareness: How Storytelling, Trust, and AI Drive Social Change, organized by the United Nations and the PVBLIC Foundation, Zenaida Yasacama participated in a panel focused on narratives, trust, and emerging technologies.
Drawing on the Amazonian experience, she emphasized that stories about territories must also be told by the people who inhabit them; that Indigenous and ancestral knowledge systems exist that are sacred and must be respected; and that protecting the Amazon can no longer be considered solely the responsibility of Indigenous peoples, but must be recognized as a global responsibility.
Financing life and territorial governance
One of the central moments of the agenda was the roundtable Financing Indigenous Territorial Stewardship: Building New Pathways for the Amazon, co-organized by the New York Community Trust, the Sacred Headwaters Alliance, The BioFi Project, Regen Network, and Fundación Pachamama.
The event brought together Indigenous leaders, foundations, funders, impact investors, and financial innovators to discuss new pathways for mobilizing resources toward Indigenous territorial stewardship.
For The Amazon Sacred Headwaters, this conversation is part of a fundamental discussion: Indigenous peoples should not be seen merely as beneficiaries of climate projects, but as territorial authorities and key actors in the design, management, and implementation of solutions.
The bioregional financing proposal seeks precisely to move in this direction by developing mechanisms that respond to the priorities, knowledge systems, governance structures, and realities of Amazonian territories.
From Advocacy to Action
Climate Week NYC enabled Sacred Headwaters to move from presenting its proposals to opening concrete opportunities for collaboration.
Throughout the week, ASHA strengthened relationships with international organizations, companies, foundations, funders, and strategic allies; positioned its Bioregional Plan internationally; and opened conversations aimed at creating mechanisms of support and financing for territories.
But the close of Climate Week does not mark the end of this process.
The next step will be to follow up on the conversations initiated, strengthen the collaboration opportunities identified, and continue building partnerships capable of turning international advocacy into concrete action within the Amazon Sacred Headwaters.
Because the proposals brought to New York were not born in international spaces.
They were born in the territories.
In the communities that protect forests, rivers, and biodiversity; in Indigenous governance systems; in economies that keep the rainforest alive; and in knowledge systems that, for generations, have sustained a different relationship between societies and nature.
Action now continues where it began: in the Amazonian territories.
From the territories to New York. From New York to action.