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August 19, 2025

Announcing the Impact Hero 2025! 📣

After much deliberation and reflection, it is with great pleasure that we announce to you the IMPACT HERO 2025 and runner-up.

In a world that feels increasingly fragmented, complex, and uncertain, it’s these changemakers—the dreamers with unrelenting determination—who remind us: As long as there are those who dare to hope, the future can still be rewritten.

This year, from a pool of 92 applicants across 18 countries, Earth Company welcomed eight inspiring changemakers from the Asia-Pacific into the Impact Heroes Class of 2025—a journey that began online and blossomed in person during Heroes Bali Camp. Each hero showed exceptional vision, commitment, and impact, making the final selection incredibly difficult.

After much deliberation and reflection, it is with great pleasure that we announce to you our Impact Hero of the Year and runner-up!

 

👑 IMPACT HERO 2025 : Freshta Karim

A former Afghan child reporter bringing safe learning opportunities through mobile libraries to children without access to education

 

Focus geography: Afghanistan
Organization: Charmaghz

 

Freshta fled from civil war, becoming a refugee at the age of four. After the fall of the Taliban, she returned to Afghanistan. At the age of 12, she began her work on TV programs as a child reporter. While working, Freshta interviewed hundreds of children across Afghanistan. Through this experience, she developed a deep understanding of what it means to grow up as a child in a country affected by conflict and acute poverty.

Due to decades-long conflict and restrictions on education, Afghan schools generally do not encourage children to think critically or ask questions. As 93% of children cannot read a simple text by age 10, the country’s education system is characterized by deep learning poverty (World Bank, 2024). In 2018, based on her experience of reading to her triplet nieces, Freshta founded Charmaghz and established a mobile library program to help children exposed to violence overcome trauma and acquire basic academic skills. Since its launch in 2018, it has had over a million visits by children in Kabul, which is unprecedented in the history of Afghanistan.

Freshta remains committed to creating innovative and safe learning opportunities for children and youth in Afghanistan, ensuring that education continues to reach those who need it most despite the challenging circumstances.

 

Reasons for Selection

 

・In Afghanistan under Taliban rule, where children's right to education is severely restricted, she is planting seeds of learning and hope. Her work creates a powerful impact for those facing such dire circumstances.

・Since a young age, she has been advocating for children’s rights in Afghanistan and has never given up. Her resilience and unwavering spirit inspire courage and hope in people around the world, and give Afghan children a reason to believe in tomorrow.

・With Earth Company’s support, we are confident that her work will ripple far and wide—delivering tangible, lasting change where it’s needed most.

 

 

A Message from Freshta

[English Transcription]
Hello, my name is Freshta Karim. I’m the founder of Charmaghz, an Afghan-run initiative that creates spaces for children to read, learn, and grow. I’m really excited to be selected as Earth Company’s Impact Hero 2025.

It’s not just recognition of me, but also it’s recognition of every child who visited our spaces and learned. It’s recognition of every Afghan parent and family member who supported our work. It’s recognition of all of my wonderful colleagues who made this work possible.

I’m really excited to be part of this journey with Earth Company and make a difference to Afghan children’s life. And I would like to thank Earth Company for trusting me and trusting our mission.

Together with Freshta, Earth Company will be committed to ensuring that education continues to reach children in Afghanistan, until December 2027.

 

🏅 IMPACT HERO 2025 Runner-Up : Tim Fijal

A visionary leader, transforming Bali into a global model through locally-rooted regenerative agriculture and tourism

 

Focus geography: Indonesia
Organization: Astungkara Way

 

Originally from Canada, Tim initiated a community engagement project at an international school in Bali, Indonesia. Through interactions with local farmers, he identified issues of soil degradation due to chemical-intensive farming and a declining interest in agriculture amongst youth. To address these challenges, he began promoting models for regenerative farming and travel by founding Astungkara Way.

Applying regenerative farming methods, farmers can increase yields while accessing multiple revenue streams by cultivating biodiversity in their rice paddies, thereby restoring ecosystems and improving their health and livelihoods. Currently, he has partnered with 170 farmers and aims to transition 7,000 hectares, or 10% of Bali’s rice fields, to regenerative farming by 2030. In addition to agriculture, Astungkara Way initiated Bali’s first coast-to-coast pilgrimage trail focused on regeneration. Tim strives to make Bali a model for regenerative practices, tackling significant issues like over tourism and the loss of farmland due to tourism development.

 

Reasons for Selection

 

・Tim embodies Earth Company’s vision of a regenerative future by putting it into practice at the grassroots level — through agriculture, community development, and tourism. His work presents a sustainable model that contributes to environmental restoration, food security, and local revitalization.

・To protect Bali’s farmlands and traditional ways of life from rapid development, they are taking a community-centered approach that revalues locally rooted agriculture and helps rebuild hope among the younger generation.

🌏 Every Hero Matters

While each year only one hero is chosen as Impact Hero of the Year, we want to pause and say this clearly:

Every single one of the eight Impact Heroes Class of 2025 has inspired us beyond words. Each of them is creating real, regenerative change in their communities, and we can’t wait to share more of their journeys with you soon.

We invite you to revisit and discover each of their stories below, and hope that you would join us in co-creating regenerative futures!