‘FIND YOUR ALLIES.’

Activist Farhana Yamin has spent her career fighting the climate crisis. One of the world’s top environmental lawyers, she is widely credited with getting the goal of net-zero emissions by 2050 into the Paris Agreement. She shares her powerful story.

ON HER CHILDHOOD: I grew up in Pakistan and was a rather feral child. My mum had four children by the age of 29. My father was an armaments engineer and an advisor to the Pakistani government; he travelled a lot for work so my grandfather helped to raise us. We moved to the UK when I was eight and a half. My mum got a job as a professional seamstress, making garments for brands such as C&A and Debenhams, and I’d help her. I loved sewing – it got me out of cooking! Most of my clothes were hand-me-downs from my sister, which was a sore point, so I was always repurposing them.

ON HER TOUGHEST MOMENT: As immigrants living in South London in the 70s and early 80s, we faced a lot of racism. I was frequently called a ‘Paki’ and stood up to the many bullies at school; I caught their eye because I dressed differently and, when I first arrived in England, everyone thought I was a boy because I had short hair. I had to learn to speak English very quickly. Our white neighbour said, ‘I’m moving out. There’s too many of you lot here.’ I remember the Brixton Riots when I was 16. You could sense the fear and tension in the community but also their fierce resistance to injustice.

ON HER CAREER: I went to a local comprehensive but was lucky to get a scholarship to study philosophy, politics and economics at Somerville College, Oxford University, an all-female college, which made it more palatable to my Muslim family. I was the first girl in my family to live away from home so it was a big deal. Despite my childhood experiences of discrimination, I was still unprepared for the levels of institutionalised racism and deep-rooted elitism there. Thankfully, I found my tribe: I joined the Labour Party, the Peace Movement and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. I was a proper socialist eco-feminist!

After I graduated, I did a law conversion course at the City of London Polytechnic (now London and Guildhall) and then joined the Foundation for International Environmental

Law and Development (FIELD), a group of public lawyers committed to helping vulnerable countries, communities and campaigners negotiate for fairer international environmental laws. It started as a three-month voluntary placement; I ended up working there for a decade and becoming a director.

From representing small island nations threatened by the effects of global heating and getting the target of net-zero emissions by 2050 included in the Paris Agreement to glueing myself to the forecourt of the Shell building as part of the Extinction Rebellion protests in 2019, my work is all about bringing the voice of the vulnerable to the table. The fossil fuel industry has known about climate devastation for decades but, like the tobacco industry, has tried to deny climate science and hoodwink the public.

‘I was the first girl in my family to live away from home so it was a big deal.’

‘I was the first girl in my family to live away from home so it was a big deal.’

‘I was the first girl in my family to live away from home so it was a big deal.’

ON HER STYLE: The first time I went to court as a 24-year-old trainee solicitor, the judge refused to let me address him because I was ‘inappropriately dressed’ in trousers and sent me back to change into a skirt. This was in 1990! In the UK legal profession, I felt like I couldn’t be me. I love bright colours and blending traditional Pakistani clothing with Western clothes. Luckily for me, the UN allowed for greater cultural diversity.

ON STAYING SANE: The past couple of years have been really hard. My 30-year marriage broke down during lockdown and there have been mental health challenges in my family. To cope, I’ve tried yoga and going to the gym but the thing that helps me most is spending time in nature – just switching my phone off and going for a walk or sitting in the garden for five minutes and listening to the birds. I’m a qualified nature educator and will be running nature-based retreats for people of colour.

ON THE FUTURE OF WORK: People may think that women are breaking glass ceilings and racism has ended – but that’s far from the truth. Of all the philanthropic funding to tackle climate change, 90% goes to organisations led by white people, and 80% goes to organisations led by men, according to a report by the Philanthropic Initiative for Racial Equity. It’s shocking. My current work focuses on challenging traditional power structures and making sure climate philanthropy is focusing on achieving climate justice, especially by funding diverse and historically marginalised people.

ON HER MOST POWERFUL PIECE OF ADVICE FOR OTHER WOMEN: Find your allies. I found mine in the climate movement. In 2013, I formed a support group with other women called The Lionesses, and we helped each other cope with the demands of negotiating the 2015 Paris Agreement. In tough moments, those support networks will save you.