We currently have 6 core team members and we work closely with each other on virtually all aspects of our work.

Harry Jonas, LLM, is a lawyer and was a co-founder and co-director of Natural Justice with Kabir Bavikatte. His life interest is in the impact of law, politics, and economics on the biosphere (i.e. how positive legal systems interact with natural laws and the laws of nature), and as a corollary, in exploring how local approaches to law and policy promote social and environmental integrity. After working for 4 years from South Africa, Harry established an office in Sabah, Malaysia, with Holly Shrumm to deepen Natural Justice’s work in the Asia-Pacific region. He engages with the full spectrum of the organization’s thinking and activities and is currently a member of the Coordinating Committee.

Kabir Sanjay Bavikatte was a co-founder and co-director of Natural Justice and later a member of the Coordinating Committee. He was a Shuttleworth Fellow from 2011-2012. He has an LL.B (National Law School of India University, Bangalore) and an LL.M in Law in Development (University of Warwick), and is currently awaiting his doctoral degree in Public Law (University of Cape Town). Over the years, Kabir has been actively involved in advocating for and writing about the rights of workers, sexual and religious minorities, farmers, livestock keepers, and Indigenous peoples. Within Natural Justice, Kabir has focused on supporting Indigenous peoples and traditional communities in ensuring that their concerns are fully represented in the development and implementation of national and international environmental law and policy, including through advising governments (most recently, South Africa, India and Bhutan) and inter-governmental organizations. He is also the legal advisor to the African Group of Countries in the international negotiations under the Convention on Biological Diversity, specifically negotiations relating to Access and Benefit Sharing and within the Working Group on Article 8(j) and related provisions. Kabir is currently providing legal support to the National Biodiversity Authority of India in its implementation of the Biodiversity Act.

Johanna von Braun started collaborating with Natural Justice soon after moving to South Africa in January 2009 for a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Cape Town’s Intellectual Property Law and Policy Research Unit. With a wealth of experience in the field of trade policy and intellectual property rights, her work focuses above all on the opportunities and challenges of market-driven incentives that affect communities, ranging from ABS and biotrade to other forms of payment for ecosystem service schemes. Based in New York City she coordinates Natural Justice’s engagement in Central and South America while also facilitiating the organization’s engagement with a number of UN agencies and programs. Johanna holds a BA Hons in Development Studies from the University of Sussex, a Masters in International Affairs from Columbia University and a PhD in Law from the University of London.  She currently serves as a member of Natural Justices’ Coordinating Committee.

Holly Shrumm has a background in zoology and anthropology and has worked with communities and NGOs on local development and natural resource management in the USA, Tajikistan, and South Africa. She joined Natural Justice in 2009 and is currently based in Sabah, Malaysia, to focus on the Asia Regional Initiative on Biocultural Community Protocols and participatory approaches to legal empowerment and community governance of territories and ecosystems.

Gino Cocchiaro is a lawyer with a background on issues related to traditional knowledge, the commons, and community rights. He is based in Cape Town, South Africa, where he focuses on the African Regional Biocultural Community Protocols (BCP) and Biocultural Rights Initiatives. He previously worked as a barrister and solicitor in Australia before joining the International Development Law Organization. At IDLO, he coordinated its project on traditional knowledge protection, which focused on the international negotiations under the Convention on Biological Diversity and the World Intellectual Property Organization’s Inter-governmental Committee on Intellectual Property, Genetic Resources and Traditional Cultural Expressions/Folklore. He currently serves on the Coordinating Committee.

Laureen Manuel is studying law and has a background in accounting, human resources, and organizational management. She is currently working as the office and financial manager in Cape Town and contributing to local activities in South Africa.

Lesle Jansen is a South African attorney (B Proc, University of the Western Cape) who specialises in indigenous peoples in international law. She is particularly interested to explore how indigenous peoples and environmental law intersect and strengthen each other. She worked for the South African Human Rights Commission prior to seeking and completing a LLM in Indigenous Peoples in International Law at the University of Arizona. She then worked as a project lawyer for the Legal Assistance Centre in Namibia where she worked with the San community on land and human rights cases. She then pursued a LLM in Rule of Law for Development in Rome, Italy from Loyola University Chicago which she expects to complete in 2013. At Natural Justice she is focused on supporting the Southern Africa region’s indigenous and local communities’ to establish their biocultural rights through instruments such as biocultural community protocols.