Aleta Baun is an award-winning Indonesian environmental activist. She has been described as the Indonesian Avatar.She won the 2013 Goldman Environmental Prize for organizing hundreds of local villagers to peacefully occupy marble mining sites in “weaving protests,” to stop destruction of sacred forest land on Mutis Mountain on the island of Timor.A leader of indigenous Mollo people, she was born to a family of farmers. 

Having lost her mother at a young age, she was raised by other women and elders in the village who taught her to respect the environment as a source of their spiritual identity and livelihood. As a community leader sharing traditional knowledge, she eventually became known as “Mama Aleta.” Mama Aleta’s work made her a target for the mining interests and local authorities, who put a price on her head. After surviving an assassination attempt, Mama Aleta went into hiding in the forest with her baby.