A Kenyan initiative training youth and women on good agricultural practices through reviving indigenous vegetable cultivation was recently named among four winners of the inaugural Earthna Prize at the Earthna Summit 2025 in Doha, Qatar.

Seeds of Change Initiative won alongside Farmer Tantoh Foundation, a water conservation initiative benefitting over 250,000 people in Cameroon, and Thriving Fisheries, Thriving Oceans by Blue Ventures, a global initiative supporting coastal communities by rebuilding traditional fisheries in locally managed marine areas.

Earthna Prize’s other winner was Fundación Sumaj Kawsay Colombia by Wuasikamas Ëconeêrã, which integrates indigenous knowledge in initiatives that reduce negative impacts on biodiversity among indigenous Colombian communities.

“Good ideas at the community level are like small tree seedlings planted in a bonsai container where they thrive, but remain limited in growth,” said Earthna Summit 2025 keynote speaker Muhammad Yunus, chief advisor to the Government of Bangladesh, highlighting the potential of all humans, which is often stifled by inflexible systems or lack of financial investment.

The Arabic word ‘Earthna’ captures the essence of sustainability, a prosperous future for humankind, and harmony with the planet. Earthna Summits aim to act as a catalyst in the efforts of countries such as Qatar to drive tangible action on climate change and sustainability.

Coordinated approach

With its focus on introducing sustainability into all facets of urban life and combining modern development approaches with traditional knowledge, the Earthna Summit 2025 facilitated dignitaries, experts, academics, government and non-governmental organisations, and leading international organisations.

Sheikha Hind bint Hamad Al Thani, Vice Chairperson and CEO, Qatar Foundation, and Abdullah bin Abdulaziz bin Turki Al Subaie, Minister of the Environment and Climate Change for Qatar, made opening remarks.

The Earthna Centre for a Sustainable Future (Earthna) was established by the Qatar Foundation to promote and enable a coordinated approach to environmental, social and economic sustainability, thereby leading to future prosperity.

At the first Earthna Summit in 2023, global regional and local policymakers focused on the challenges facing hot and arid environments. They aimed to dispel the perception that these environments are less relevant to sustainability, since most global discussions tend to concentrate on issues pertinent to tropical and temperate countries.

Earthna Summit 2023 showcased indigenous, sustainable practices that span cultural, environmental and social sustainability. In April 2024, Earthna established the Earthna Prize initiative to identify and celebrate projects from across the globe that showcase how traditional knowledge and cultural heritage can be integrated into solutions to the most pressing environmental challenges.

Kenya’s Seeds of Change Initiative was among 12 finalists chosen from over 400 submissions from more than 100 countries in which applicants focused on one of four key areas – water resource management, food security, sustainable urbanism, and land stewardship. Each finalist will receive a portion of a US$1 million prize pool to continue their initiatives and increase their impact.

During last month’s Earthna Summit 2025, speakers underlined the potential of combining “high tech with no tech” for achieving climate and sustainability objectives and improving the liveability of cities in hot and arid regions. The discussions were centred on this edition’s theme ‘Building Our Legacy: Sustainability, Innovation and Traditional Knowledge’.

The Earthna Village’s location in the heart of the capital reflected these practices and represented an urban haven designed to “nurture living leisure, and business in perfect harmony”, according to the hosts. All buildings carry either Gold or Platinum Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design or LEED certification.

Alongside the summit, and International Network for Traditional Building, Architecture and Urbanism, or INTBAU, track provided a platform to showcase traditional knowledge in architecture within urban settings.

The announcement of the four Earthna Prize winners was one of the highlights of the summit for projects or actors integrating ancestral knowledge and cultural heritage in tackling modern environmental challenges.

Earthna Summit 2025 also featured the findings of the forthcoming report on the Arid Cities Network from the six pilot cities of Doha (Qatar), Jaipur (India), Seville (Spain), Lima (Peru), Marrakesh (Morocco), and Muscat (Oman).

High-level and expert panel sessions included exploring sustainable solutions for resilience to water scarcity, opportunities, challenges and the road ahead for the energy transition, and harnessing artificial intelligence (AI) for smart governance.

Other sessions deliberated on how to fund a sustainable future by reimagining climate finance, rethinking urban sustainability by adopting lessons learned from traditional architecture, future-proofing cities to ensure they are smart, sustainable, and liveable.

Prodding youths

Experts also discussed how to harness partnerships to amplify traditional sustainable urban solutions, and how the tradition-technology can address food security.

Describing the impact of finding inspiration from role models as a teenager, British actor and musician, the Golden Globe winner Idris Elba, who is also the UN Goodwill Ambassador for International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), said the primary reason for his active involvement in sustainability initiatives is to inspire other young people “at every opportunity”.

Elba advocated for the use of social media platforms, highlighting the example of young Africans sharing sound agricultural practices via TikTok. He emphasised the importance of “breaking the mould” of the bonsai container, noting that in order for “each one” to “teach one” you have to “reach one”.

There was a panel on ‘Water Scarcity: Exploring Sustainable Solutions for Resilience’ highlighting best practices and insights from Earthna’s newly-launched report on Traditional Knowledge in Water Resource Management.

Experts engaged in a lively discussion on the rich body of indigenous and traditional practices available to address the water crisis. Moderator and journalist Maryam Nemazee described water as one of the most critical issues of our time, being at the heart of every sustainability challenge.

She remarked that people in arid regions have pioneered innovative water technologies, which have remained highly relevant in building water resilience over the centuries, noting that the tricky part is how to access, apply, and scale this knowledge.

Dr Ann-Perry Witmer from the University of Illinois, welcomed the Earthna report, which contains case studies from Oman, the southwestern US, and Peru. “The technology that grows up in a place is the best technology for that place,” she emphasised.

She shared her experience working with communities in the Navajo Nation, paying tribute to their profound reverence for water, a stark contrast with the dominant approach of controlling nature.

Dr Mazoor Qadir, Deputy Director, United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health, lamented that events on water technologies far outnumber events dedicated to traditional knowledge water solutions.

He cautioned against leaving the critical importance of indigenous knowledge systems and their context aside and instead focusing on “bigger solutions like desalination and water treatment”.

Dr Rajendra Singh, chairman, Tarun Bharat Sangh, described traditional knowledge as “the most modern system” but stressed that obstacles to implementing that system remain, often coming from governments that have different priorities.

Dr Raha Hakimdavar of Georgetown University in Qatar, urged societies to revive the cultural respect for water seen in arid regions.

“It’s not that we need more technology,” she said, noting that the real challenge is to “appreciate and understand water”.

Speakers said that by integrating traditional and modern approaches, knock-on benefits can be generated for climate adaptation mitigation efforts in arid regions.