Dayana BLANCO QUIROGA

Dayana Blanco Quiroga is an Indigenous regeneration leader from Bolivia and founder of the Uru Uru Team, a community-led initiative restoring Lake Uru Uru through ancestral wetland knowledge combined with science-based ecosystem repair. Raised in the Vito community, she learned from her grandparents that water, land, and identity are inseparable parts of a living system. This worldview guides her work to regenerate contaminated high-altitude wetlands using native aquatic plants, particularly Totoras, as a nature-based solution for climate resilience. Under her leadership, the Uru Uru Team has achieved measurable impact, documenting up to 30% reduction in water pollution levels in pilot restoration zones through phytoremediation and community-led monitoring. She mobilizes seven Indigenous communities, training women and youth in ecological restoration, water-quality data collection, and intergenerational environmental education rooted in culture. Her work bridges scientific evidence with ancestral knowledge, demonstrating that effective sustainability solutions must be both ecological and cultural. By restoring wetlands while strengthening Indigenous identity, language, and stewardship, she represents a new generation of Indigenous climate leaders committed to scalable regeneration and global collaboration.