Local author recognised by UNESCO for ocean literacy work

Carisa Lee

Lo­cal au­thor and ac­tivist Aleeyah Ali has re­ceived in­ter­na­tion­al recog­ni­tion for her work in ocean lit­er­a­cy through the Blue Thread ini­tia­tive, launched in late 2024 by UN­ESCO’s In­ter­gov­ern­men­tal Oceano­graph­ic Com­mis­sion.

The ini­tia­tive recog­nis­es in­di­vid­u­als who place ocean un­der­stand­ing at the cen­tre of glob­al sus­tain­abil­i­ty ef­forts. The se­lec­tion com­mit­tee said Ali’s work aligns with the Venice De­c­la­ra­tion, a glob­al call to ac­tion for ocean stew­ard­ship.

Ali said the recog­ni­tion strength­ens her ef­forts to in­spire the next gen­er­a­tion of ocean stew­ards across the Caribbean.

“This recog­ni­tion cel­e­brates our work in In­dige­nous-led ocean lit­er­a­cy, wildlife con­ser­va­tion, and en­vi­ron­men­tal ed­u­ca­tion,” Ali said. “It em­pow­ers the youth and com­mu­ni­ties of Trinidad and To­ba­go to un­der­stand the vi­tal role the ocean plays in sus­tain­ing life on Earth.”

Ali’s work cen­tres on what she de­scribes as a “liv­ing class­room”, which com­bines sto­ry­telling and res­cued wildlife with en­vi­ron­men­tal ed­u­ca­tion. The ap­proach draws on the an­ces­tral knowl­edge of the Warao and Kali­na peo­ple along­side mod­ern en­vi­ron­men­tal sci­ence, pro­mot­ing a holis­tic way of car­ing for rivers, coast­lines and oceans.

Ali said the recog­ni­tion came amid sig­nif­i­cant per­son­al chal­lenges, in­clud­ing se­ri­ous health is­sues, the ab­sence of in­sti­tu­tion­al fund­ing and the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of car­ing for more than 200 res­cued an­i­mals.

“I have faced the pos­si­bil­i­ty of se­ri­ous ill­ness and on­go­ing med­ical debt, yet every chal­lenge be­came a call to ac­tion,” she said. “Every res­cued an­i­mal, every child reached, and every sto­ry told is a step to­ward a sus­tain­able, just, and cul­tur­al­ly vi­brant fu­ture.”

With UN­ESCO’s en­dorse­ment, Ali plans to present her work at the Where Oceans Join 2026 Con­fer­ence. She has al­so sub­mit­ted re­search pa­pers to in­ter­na­tion­al con­fer­ences and uni­ver­si­ties, fo­cus­ing on Blue Car­bon, food se­cu­ri­ty, so­cial in­no­va­tion and cli­mate re­silience.