From May 14th to the 15th, 2019, TDN President/Founder Ariel Rojas attended the 4th Annual Multi-Stakeholder Forum on Science, Technology and Innovation for the SDGs (STI Forum), which launched a call for innovations to accelerate progress towards education, job creation, peace and reduced inequalities. The Forum is also addressing a number of cross-cutting themes, including the impacts of rapid technological change, STI roadmaps, gender and STI, and indigenous knowledge.

TDN President/Founder Ariel Rojas had the immense privilege to interact briefly with a group of high school students (Saint Barnabas HS, The Bronx), who were having a U.N. guide tour to learn about the SDGs. As an ECOSOC NGO representative, he was informally invited by their teachers to speak with them regarding social impact and personal responsibility at a local level.

Indigenous people are the owners of a shared knowledge that comes from their interaction with the land. Innovation is their way of survival by contemplating the perpetual cycle of life. Science is codified in their oral traditions and they call it wisdom… TDN President/Founder Ariel Rojas posing with indigenous leaders: (L to R) Mr. Freddy Mamani Gutierrez, Aymara architect in the Plurinational State of Bolivia; Mr. Josè R. López (moderator); Ms. Minnie Degawan, Director of the Indigenous and Traditional People Program of Conservation; and Ms. Chandra Roy-Henriksen, Chief of the Secretariat of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.