Nnimmo Bassey is director of the ecological think-tank, Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF) and member steering committee of Oilwatch International – a network resisting the expansion of fossil fuels extraction in the Global South. He was chair of Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) (2008-2012) and Executive Director of Nigeria’s Environmental Rights Action (1993-2013). Bassey serves on the boards of a number of non-profit organisation including Global Greengrants Fund, Action Group on Erosion, Technology and Concentration (ETC Group), and of Navdanya International. He was a co-recipient of the 2010 Right Livelihood Award also known as the “Alternative Noble Prize.” In 2012 he received the Rafto Human Rights Award. In 2014 he received Nigeria’s national honour as Member of the Federal Republic (MFR) in recognition of his environmental activism. Bassey is a Fellow of the Nigerian Institute of Architects and has authored books on the environment, architecture and poetry. He is also a Member of the Action Research Network for a Wellbeing Economy in Africa (WE-Africa). His books include We Thought it Was Oil, But It was Blood – Poetry (Kraft Books, 2002), I will Not Dance to Your Beat – Poetry (Kraft Books, 2011), To Cook a Continent - Destructive Extraction and the Climate Crisis in Africa (Pambazuka Press, 2012) and Oil Politics – Echoes of Ecological War (Daraja Press, 2016). He writes a weekly column, The Instigator, focusing on socio-ecological transformation in The Leadership Newspaper (Nigeria)
