Nnimmo Bassey

Bassey is the founder and director of Health of Mother Earth Foundation, an environmental think tank promoting ecological justice and food sovereignty across Africa. He was named one of Time magazine's Heroes of the Environment in 2009 and has received several international recognitions, including Laureate of the Right Livelihood Award (2010), the Rafto Prize (2012), Nigeria's national honour of Member of the Federal Republic (MFR) (2014), two honorary doctorates from the University of York, UK (2019) and York University, Canada (2023), and the Wallenberg Medal of the University of Michigan (2024).

Nnimmo Bassey studied at New York University. The recorded working language is English and Yoruba. The field of work recorded is environmentalist. Works named in the authority record are We Thought it was Oil-- But it was Blood, I Will Not Dance to Your Beat, To Cook a Continent: Destructive Extraction and the Climate Crisis in Africa and Oil Politics: Echoes of Ecological Wars. Distinctions recorded are Right Livelihood Award and Rafto Prize.

• Name — Nnimmo Bassey • Born — 11 June 1958 • Birthplace — Nigeria • Occupation — Nigeria architect, environmental activist, author and poet

Nnimmo Bassey was born on 11 June 1958 in Nigeria. He grew up in the Niger Delta region, an area marked by extractivist oil production and recurring environmental problems. He attended primary and secondary school in the region before studying architecture at the University of Nigeria. After completing his architectural training, he worked in the public sector for about ten years and later continued in private practice. During this period, he developed an interest in social and environmental issues, which led him to become involved in human rights work in the 1980s. He later served on the Board of Directors of Nigeria's Civil Liberties Organisation before moving fully into environmental and community-based advocacy.

Bassey became active in human rights work in the 1980s when he served on the Board of Directors of Nigeria's Civil Liberties Organisation. His early advocacy addressed civic freedoms and environmental concerns affecting communities in the Niger Delta. During this period, he began to link human-rights violations with the impacts of resource extraction, a connection that later shaped his work in environmental justice.

In 2011, Bassey founded the Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF), an ecological think tank and advocacy organisation working on environmental justice, climate impacts and food sovereignty in Africa. Based in Nigeria, HOMEF runs research, capacity-building and community engagement programmes that examine issues such as fossil-fuel extraction, climate change, biotechnology, land use and corporate accountability, especially by oli companies. HOMEF convenes learning and monitoring activities with communities affected by environmental degradation, produces reports on ecological and socio-economic impacts, and hosts policy dialogues involving civil society groups, academics and public officials. Under Bassey's direction, the organisation has collaborated with regional and international networks working on climate justice and environmental governance. HOMEF also publishes educational materials on ecological health, agroecology and the political dimensions of environmental change.

Bassey co-founded Environmental Rights Action (ERA), also known as Friends of the Earth Nigeria, in 1993 and served as its executive director until 2013. During his tenure, ERA carried out campaigns on oil pollution, gas flaring, deforestation, tobacco control and genetic engineering. The organisation supported community efforts to document environmental damage, pursued litigation against oil companies, and contributed to regional initiatives on food sovereignty and environmental monitoring. ERA received international recognition for its work, including the Sophie Prize in 1998 and the Bloomberg Award for tobacco control activism in 2009.

Since 1996, Bassey has been associated with Oilwatch Africa, a network formed to link communities affected by oil and gas extraction. He later contributed to the development of Oilwatch International, a Global South network promoting alternatives to fossil-fuel expansion. Through these networks, he has worked with groups in Africa, South America and Southeast Asia to monitor extraction impacts and support community-based responses. Bassey has served on the steering committee of Oilwatch International since its inception.

From 2008 to 2012, Bassey chaired Friends of the Earth International (FOEI), the world's largest grassroots environmental federation. In this role, he worked with member organisations across all regions, supported international campaigns on climate justice and resource extraction, and represented FOEI in global environmental forums. His tenure led to increased collaboration among Global South organisations responding to environmental degradation linked to extractive industries.

Bassey has been recognised for his contributions to environmental justice and community rights across several decades of work with national and international organisations. His leadership in Environmental Rights Action, Oilwatch networks and the Health of Mother Earth Foundation has supported public awareness of oil pollution, gas flaring, land degradation and other impacts of fossil-fuel extraction in the Niger Delta and comparable regions. Through his writing and public commentary, he has contributed to debates on climate policy, ecological governance and the social costs of resource exploitation in the Global South. Nnimmo Bassey he been associated with several environmental justice campaigns, such as the “Ogonize and Yasunize” campaign. This campaign, which Bassey has promoted for long, was introduced by the Health of Mother Earth Foundation and Oilwatch International during the COP30 climate conference in Belém, Brazil. The initiative draws on the experiences of oil-impacted communities in the Ogoni region of Nigeria and the Yasuni territory in Ecuador, and calls attention to the environmental and social effects of oil extraction while linking local resistance efforts with wider international discussions on climate action.

• Beyond Simple Lines: The Architecture of Chief G.Y. Aduku and Archcon (co-authored, 1993) • The Management of Construction (1994) • Living Houses (2005)

Nnimmo Bassey is recorded as politician, writer, architect, poet and climate activist.

• Patriots & Cockroaches (1992) • Poems on the Run (1994) • Intercepted (1998) • We Thought It Was Oil But It Was Blood (2002) • I Will Not Dance to Your Beat (2011) • I See the Invisible (2023)