Abigail Kitma

Abigail is an Ibaloy-Igorot woman from Northern Philippines. She currently lives in Baguio City, Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR). As a staff member of the Indigenous Peoples Rights Program, some of Abigail’s responsibilities include; monitoring and engaging in national and global (currently the CBD and more recently Business and Human Rights) policy processes relevant for indigenous peoples, and coordinating Tebtebba participation in national networks relevant for indigenous peoples’ rights. Recently, Abigail and her organisation, in partnership with the IPMG Secretariat, provided support to a series of activities under the Global Indigenous Peoples Technical and Strategy Meeting. Abigail’s main role was to support the work of the Secretariat (coordinating participants, steering committee and logistic support to the orientation webinars, etc.), as well as to assist in some substantive elements to the work. Abigail sees this training as an opportunity to develop her understanding of possible regional and global mechanisms her organisation’s partner communities can utilise when sharing their issues and concerns. She also believes that the training can inform NGO workers such as herself with the knowledge and tools to engage in business and human rights processes autonomously.