When and where were you born? How was Nature a key part of your experience growing up in British Columbia? Can you share a scene when you were, say, seven years old that you still think of today? This could be a glimpse of wildlife, a wild river swim, cooking outdoors… Some small glimpse of something more important than yourself at such a young age.
I was born in British Columbia, Canada, to parents who had immigrated from Uganda. Growing up, we didn’t have extravagant vacations but spent a lot of time outdoors and so I fell in love with Nature at a young age. My family loved camping in the mountains in the interior of BC, and our home in Richmond was surrounded by wetlands, immersing me in the natural world from a very young age.
My summers as a child often included family trips to Sheridan Lake in the Cariboo Chilcotin region of British Columbia. My dad’s employer at the time had built cabins, which he offered as a retreat for employees. Every summer we would make the six-hour drive north, and this journey itself was an experience, taking us through some of the most stunning and contrasting landscapes BC has to offer: from the Cascade Mountains to alpine forests and then into the dry, rugged interior that looked like something out of the Old West. Towns from the gold rush and remnants of old logging operations – visible markers of how human activity had shaped the land. Those drives every summer deepened my appreciation for the province’s diverse beauty, and the vast wildlife in Canada.
Fast-forward a decade and tell us about joining the anti-logging protests and your emotional response to that devastation and destruction of the environment.
This connection to Nature that had begun at a young age was shaken for the first time when I encountered large-scale environmental destruction. I first began my environmental journey over 30 years ago as part of the Clayoquot protests in Vancouver to oppose old-growth forest logging. No one had prepared me for the sight of clear-cut land that stretched for three hours of the drive to the protest. What had once been a thriving forest now laid bare as a barren, man-made moonscape. Hundreds of kilometres of trees had been logged, leaving only dead, grey branches behind. I remember feeling horrified, wondering where all that wildlife had gone. It was the first time I truly grasped the scale of human impact on the environment.
By the time I arrived at the anti-logging protests in Clayoquot Sound, over 1,000 people had already gathered. Tofino was buzzing with activity, and public spaces were filled with people from all over the world who had come to take a stand. I remember there was an overwhelming sense of urgency, a feeling that we were part of something historic. The protests were making national headlines, and when negotiations with Indigenous leaders finally happened, it felt like we were witnessing history unfold in real time.
Many environmentalists I’ve met since then have their own ‘Clayoquot moment’ – a defining event that turned them into conservationists. It also made me realise how easy it is for people to ignore what they can’t see. When destruction happens in remote places, it is out of sight, out of mind. That is why storytelling and documentation are crucial, something I learned very early on as I founded my environmental organisation, Age of Union.
One of our biggest priorities is using film to bring these hidden stories to light. When we travel to places like the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Amazon rainforest, or Haiti, we go to extraordinary lengths to document and showcase these fragile ecosystems that are vulnerable due to their remoteness – because once people see what’s at stake, then they will care.
How cut off is the tech world from what really matters, i.e. safeguarding our planet and all we share it with?
I believe there is a huge opportunity for the tech industry to play a bigger role in conservation. In tech, things move fast and are changing from year to year – an innovation that’s groundbreaking today might be obsolete in five years. But Nature operates on a different timeline. A protected area, if left undisturbed, can last forever.
Tech entrepreneurs have the means to create a lasting legacy, and I’m starting to see more interest in that. There are real lessons that people who are in technology can learn from Nature – its adaptability and its resilience. Even when degraded, Nature has the power to heal itself, and I think that is something worth protecting.
Will AI save us all?
As more people turn to AI to provide real insights and predictions, I see its potential to illustrate to people the true value of conservation, of protecting vulnerable areas and of showcasing the ability for degraded ecosystems to come back to their natural state. Whether in the fight for climate change, or helping habitats for biodiversity, there is potential for AI to help us understand the value, capacity and future of Nature.
Part of what my organisation, Age of Union, aims to do is to help different boots-on-the-ground conservation groups learn from one another. Many of the smaller conservationists have limited teams, so we may see smaller organisations with limited resources use AI to fill operational gaps to increase efficiency for their own needs.
Share something about your key projects, including the Black Hole Experience arts projects and the Juma Institute for New Knowledge Centre.
Last autumn, I travelled with Dr Jane Goodall to the Amazon to meet with Juma Xipaia, an Indigenous leader belonging to the Xipaya people and founder of the Juma Institute, to explore the ways we could take inspiration from Jane’s Roots & Shoots project to preserve Indigenous knowledge and traditions, not only for Indigenous youth, but for all members of the local and surrounding Indigenous communities.
Indigenous knowledge is key to safeguarding the forest – its ecological, medicinal, biodiverse and cultural value. If this knowledge is not passed down, the forest loses its greatest protectors. One of the many opportunities the new knowledge centre will offer is reinforcing knowledge within the village of Kaarimã, while also passing down ancestral wisdom rooted in the territory.
The Black Hole Experience (BHX) is a mobile exhibition created by Age of Union to explore another dimension of transformation, one that uses immersive art and spiritual exploration to inspire real change. We live in a time where deep reflection and connection are more important than ever, and BHX is designed to be a tool for that – helping people share, reflect, and reach one another on a deeper level through innovative means.
Sometimes we forget our place in the natural world, believing we dominate it rather than exist within it. But moments of awe, like standing before a vast ocean, or experiencing something as infinite as the cosmos, pull us back into that connection. BHX provides us a time to reset and step into a feeling of wonder, to reconnect with Nature on a deeper level.
With season 2 of BHX coming in 2025, we want to keep building on that experience; giving people a space to reflect, spark conversations, shift perspectives, and also inspiring a new generation of changemakers.
Jane Goodall is widely recognised as an inspiring elder, as well as a conservationist and pioneering scientist. What have you learned from her?
Working alongside Jane Goodall has been such an immense honour. There is a tremendous amount to learn from Jane’s life, most notably the power of her generosity and her incredible sense of purpose. She is in constant motion: travelling, working, advocating. Her energy is boundless because she’s driven by a mission.
One of my favourite memories from our time together in the Amazon was sitting at the base of a tree, listening to Jane share a story about a fly. She was alone in a forest when a fly landed on her knee. She said instead of simply labelling it for what it is, she saw a small creature that is a living soul and part of the living tapestry of Nature – connected, whole, and full of meaning. That’s the way Jane sees the world and Nature. Her purpose is unwavering, and that deep connection to the harmony of the natural world is what makes her work so powerful. It’s a lesson in what’s possible when you dedicate your life to something bigger than yourself, and it is truly inspirational.
What role do you hope you will be playing in the world when you too are about to celebrate your 90th birthday?
When we think about the future and when I turn 90, like Jane, I hope I’m still contributing to the fight for Nature. That is the kind of legacy I hope to leave. Hopefully, by then, we’ll be looking at conservation differently, with more people than ever joining a collective effort. Because in the end, the fight for Nature is a fight for our own survival. It’s not just about saving species or landscapes; it’s about securing a future for humankind.
Age of Union was founded on the idea of bringing more voices into environmental conservation. Every year, I’m amazed at how much we’re able to accomplish, and how many people join the movement. I’m excited to see where we go from here, because the more people who stand up for Nature, the stronger our chances of protecting it are for generations to come.
Please introduce your book, Echoes from Eden: A Daring Voyage to Protect Earth’s Last Wild Places.
In 2020, I launched Age of Union, a non-profit environmental alliance that works on the ground to protect the planet’s threatened species and ecosystems. I seeded the organisation by funding $40 million to support 10 environmental projects around the world.
In Canada, we protected forests, estuaries and watersheds that support keystone species like eagles and salmon. In Africa, we supported reforestation, agriculture, and community projects, in addition to helping local communities secure titles for millions of acres, including a wildlife corridor for eastern lowland gorillas. In Trinidad, we helped protect leatherback turtles. In Indonesia, we secured forests for gibbons and orangutans. And off the coast of Europe and Africa, we funded a Sea Shepherd vessel to protect dolphins and defend the coasts against illegal fishing practices.
In my book Echoes from Eden, I travel to all of these places and provide a first-hand account on the ground of what I am seeing in rainforests, estuaries and oceans around the world. We meet the changemakers in each of the organisations and explore the places they fight so hard to protect. The book begins with my first visit to the Amazon, where I visited Paul Rosolie of Junglekeepers, with whom we protected thousands of acres of old-growth forests. In the last chapter, I return to the Amazon in Brazil with Jane Goodall and we stay with the Xipaya Indigenous people and discover how the local communities and animals are being poisoned by illegal mining in their forests and rivers and how they are fighting to save their way of life.
Dax Dasilva is a global tech leader and environmental activist. In 2019 he published his book Age of Union as a compelling guide for igniting today’s environmental changemakers. This would later inspire setting up the environmental non-profit Age of Union with a goal of protecting the planet’s threatened species and ecosystems. His second book, Echoes from Eden, was published by Penguin Random House in April 2025.
Age of Union
The Black Hole Experience
The Juma Institute
Jane Goodall’s Roots & Shoots UK
