Activism of the Year 2000

When he was just 16, Delhi-based student Aditya Mukarji decided to make it his mission to go door-to-door, campaigning against what he describes as “one of the most dangerous inventions by man”: single-use plastic. In the two years that followed, Mukarji, now 18, has stopped the use of over 26 million single-use plastic items — plastic straws, plastic cutlery and stirrers — in hotels and restaurants. As co-founder of The Alternatives, he even ensures that the establishments he works with give him an inventory of the single-use plastic items they have stopped buying.

Anya Dillard is a 19-year-old activist, philanthropist, social entrepreneur, content creator, and aspiring filmmaker. She is also the founder of The Next Gen Come Up – a 501(c)3 nonprofit that encourages young people to explore activism, pursue community service, and raise awareness through creative expression. In her community, Anya is best known for helping to organize the largest civil rights protests in West Orange history (garnering an audience of over 3,000 people), co-organizing her town’s first-ever Juneteenth Celebration, contributing to her high school's first climate strike walkout, and being appointed as president of the first all-female all POC Student Council cabinet in her high school’s history. Most recently, Anya partnered with The Emmett Till Legacy Foundation and co-founded the Youth Never Let Up Coalition – a collective of Gen Z organizers that are collectively working with the Till family to organize actions demanding justice for Emmett Till and push for Carolyn Bryant Donham to face federal charges for her involvement in Till’s lynching.

While a second-year pharmacy student Daniel learned about the devastating effects of Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) in children living in urban settlements and set up ‘Students Against Superbugs Africa’ to promote behaviour change and education on how to reduce this threat. He aims to educate communities about the rational use of antimicrobials and help to build sustainable strategies that could reduce exposure to their diseases, such as promoting hygiene and sanitation, and lobbying for the government to improve infrastructural development in these areas. Through his leadership, the organisation has empowered more than 20,000 young people in Africa through their different programmes.

Emily Unity is an award-winning founder and lived experience professional. As Lived Experience Lead at the Royal Children's Hospital, Emily has established a Lived Experience Engagement Strategy that is the first of its kind at the Hospital. They have recruited over 1500 Lived Experience Advisors, who are remunerated to share their lived experience to co-design meaningful initiatives.Emily founded Multicultural Minds to raise awareness of minority mental health lived experiences. They are also a Board Director of Midsumma, Australia’s premier LGBTQIA+ cultural festival with 200,000 attendees annually, whilst acting as an advisory member for UNICEF, Headspace, ReachOut, the RANZCP, the NSPO, and the NMHC."ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF COUNTRYI acknowledge that I am writing this on the land of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation and I pay respect to their Elders and young people, past, present, and emerging. I acknowledge that sovereignty was never been ceded and this always was and always will be Aboriginal land.ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF LIVED AND LIVING EXPERIENCESI also acknowledge the individual and collective expertise of all people with lived and living experiences of mental health and social and emotional wellbeing. I acknowledge that we are each the experts of our own experience and I look forward to working alongside you to ensure that there is "nothing about us without us."

In 2020, 14-year-old Hanson took notice of the racial injustice and inequality of African Americans highlighted in the media. She said this inspired her to create a way for kids, like herself, to identify and share their feelings on why Black Lives Matter through poetry and artwork. Within the first year, "I Matter" poetry competition received about 150 submissions from students around the world. By 2022, that number has risen to over 700.

Isidora Guzmán Silva is an inclusion and gender equality activist from Chile who uses her social media following to raise awareness on the rights of people with disabilities. At 13, she created an app for people with disabilities to find parking lots. She then founded “Encuentra tu lugar” (Find Your Place), an organization that raises awareness on human rights and gender equality by fostering inclusion in society and helping people with disabilities access education and legal information.In 2020, Isidora started a digital community that promotes inclusion, equality, and rights of people with disabilities on social media. Currently, she is a counselor at the NGO “Tenemos que hablar de Chile”, and “National Gender Youth Activist” for UN Women as a member of the UN Generation Equality Adolescent Mobilization Committee. Isidora was also one of the initial members of “Fundación Tremendas”, a girl-led platform to connect and empower girls and young women to achieve sustainable development across Latin America.

Kiara Kaur is the world's youngest TEDx speaker – at age five, she gave a talk on 'Unboxing Curiosity' in India on Children's Day on 14 November 2021. She also holds the record for Youngest Non-stop Book Reader, having read 36 books in 105 minutes at an event hosted by the Guinness Book of Records in London.

Datt started Green the Gene as a student environmental club in 2004 - when he was 8 years old - after learning that India's water table, or the level of water underneath the soil, was falling by almost two feet every year. Now Green the Gene is an environmental nonprofit with more than 7,000 student volunteers who have developed and deployed 8,000 low-cost water-filtration devices to 62 countries. The organization says its devices filter 14.4 million liters of water annually, providing safe drinking water to more than 40,000 people.

Maisie Brown is leading an effort to deliver drinking water to residents who can’t make it to the city’s distribution centers. In response to the ongoing Mississippi water crisis, she has delivered more than 50,000 bottles of water city-wide to more than 300 households.

Manisha Meem Nipun Hijra is a trans youth trainer and human rights activist from the southern part of Bangladesh. She identifies as a trans woman and has been working as the representative of the transgender community in the remote areas of Bangladesh including the hill tracts. In 2019, she started working for ‘Pathchola Foundation’ as a founding member. She provides a variety of programmes and emergency aid that have significantly impacted more than 3,000 transgender/Hijra people. The organisation has also rescued ten transgender individuals from sex work in 2020-2021 and helped them build sustainable livelihood.

Melati Wijsen is the founder of Youthtopia and Bye Bye Plastic Bags. Melati has spent the last 6+ years raising awareness about the waste problem in Bali through delivering school presentations and workshops, organizing beach clean-ups, providing 35,000+ alternative bags, creating a plastic bag free pilot village, lobbying with local and national governments, and speaking at a variety of local and global events. In 2019, Melati successfully banned plastic bags, straws and Styrofoam on their home island Bali. Since then, they have spoken at TED and the United Nations and has also been selected among Forbes' top ten most inspiring women in the country.

Through advocacy, I was awarded 16.5 million grant from federal VIC Government to develop sustainable E-waste disposal services, which was accompanied by a $50,000 grant from VicHealth to engage youth in body image & mental health events. This year, I have been so grateful to be able to represent Australian Youth’s voices and spoken at the Mental Health Foundation Australia National Summit for 600+ people, and have represented over 110,000 people as a youth councillor for the Boorondara Region.For my community endeavours, I was awarded the Australia Day Young Citizen of the Year.