Melina is a Brazilian biologist and environmental justice advocate, who has always been intrigued by the wonders of nature and all of its inhabitants. She is the co-founder of the Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN), the international youth coordination platform and constituency to the Convention on Biological Diversity and coordinator of GYBN’s capacity building and empowerment programme. For the past 10 years, she has helped establish and develop the network to become a vibrant global youth movement for biodiversity with 1.2 million members and member organizations in 145 countries and in 2020, she has been awarded the Midori Prize for Biodiversity
in recognition of her achievements.