Inna Modja

Inna Modja is a Malian-French artist, cultural entrepreneur and climate advocate. She was born in Bamako and built her career in Paris, and her work has moved steadily between the two: from pop records made in France to albums rooted in Malian music, and from the recording studio to the rooms where international climate policy gets written.

She has released three studio albums and two EPs. Everyday Is a New World (2009) opened with "Let's Go to Bamako" and introduced her to a French audience. Love Revolution (2011) followed, carrying "French Cancan" and "La fille du Lido". Motel Bamako (2015) turned toward home, with Oumou Sangaré, Oxmo Puccino and Baloji among its guests and songs such as "Tombouctou", "Water" and "Boat People" that answered the crisis then unfolding in northern Mali. Her most recent release, The Great Green Wall (2026), gathers voices from across the continent, including Songhoy Blues, Waje, Didier Awadi and Betty G.

She speaks publicly against female genital mutilation. She and her four sisters were cut as children, without their parents' approval. She has written about it in her music and spoken about it openly for years, and she later underwent reconstructive surgery with Dr Ghada Hatem-Gantzer. Much of her advocacy since has been about making both the practice and the possibility of repair speakable, for women and girls who are usually asked to carry it in silence.

In 2019 she appeared in the documentary The Great Green Wall, directed by Jared P. Scott, which followed the African-led effort to restore a band of land stretching across the Sahel. She is credited as principal cast, as composer alongside Charlie Mole, and as co-executive producer. The film had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival on 31 August 2019, in the Giornate degli Autori section, and went on to win seven awards.

That work led directly to the rest. In April 2023 the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification appointed her a Goodwill Ambassador, alongside the Senegalese musician Baaba Maal; both had previously served as UNCCD Land Ambassadors. In the role she represents the Convention's 197 parties, speaking on land restoration, drought, and the disproportionate weight both place on women and girls.

She is CEO and co-founder of Code Green, a nonprofit working where art, technology and climate action meet. Through it she directs strategy, fundraising and institutional partnerships, and has developed educational programmes including HEALV3RSE, a curriculum-based climate literacy platform built with the UNCCD and Animoca Brands. Her partnerships span the World Bank, UCLA, Christie's, and the Ministries of Culture of France and Saudi Arabia.

In 2022 the World Economic Forum named her to its Young Global Leaders class, in the Arts, Culture and Sports category. In 2024 the BBC included her in its 100 Women list, describing her as an artist and climate advocate. In May 2021 she was appointed a Knight of the French National Order of Merit, on the report of the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs.

She also acts. Most recently she played Inissa in "L’ami français", an episode of the France 2 series Capitaine Marleau broadcast in May 2025.

Across all of it the throughline holds: she treats culture as a way of reaching people that policy alone does not, and she works on the things that shaped her, Mali, the Sahel, and the bodies and land that carry the cost of what happens to them.