IHEU is particularly concerned with empowerment - giving oppressed people the means to be independent and take responsibility for their lives. This may involve education and training, teaching people about their legal rights, equipping villages for sustainable farming and with medical facilities and so on. This ideal inspires much of humanists' work for other people. IHEU actively campaigns against human rights abuses, some of which are perpetrated in the name of religion, such as temple prostitution in India, or female genital mutilation in many Muslim countries. In these days humanists are increasingly concerned about the state of the environment, and finding sustainable ways to live that do not continue the appalling damage to other creatures, plants and the atmosphere.
Human rights come first, but environmental factors are vitally important too.
This is a difficult balance, and one where we in the richer, developed world have a huge responsibility to the future of all people around the world.