Posts in Indigenous knowledge
Campaign for Nature calls for inclusivity ahead of COP28

Daily Star Kenya

13 October 2023

Campaign for Nature has urged stakeholders to include both climate and nature solutions for the most affected individuals in local communities.  In an interview with the Star, the director Brian O’Donnell said it was time for indigenous people to have their rights upheld. "Climate and nature solutions should be inclusive and equitable. Not forgetting the financial bit, which should get to the people really affected by climate change," O’Donnell said.


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30x30, indigenous rights, Indigenous led, Indigenous people, Indigenous knowledgeKaty Roxburgh
‘We are the guardians of vanishing ecosystems’

UNDP

August 4, 2022
Reiyia is among leaders fighting for the rights of Indigenous communities and calling for stronger action, as up to 80 percent of the negotiating text in the 20 action targets of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework draft agreement have remained unresolved, threatening progress at the up-coming COP15 conference. While almost 100 countries support the proposal to protect at least 30 percent of the planet’s land and ocean by 2030 under the framework, with the protection of Indigenous rights a critical element of this initiative, countries failed to agree on fundamental issues.

These prominent issues include how much funding would be committed to conserve biodiversity; or what percentage figures the world should strive to protect, conserve and restore to address the extinction crisis. Experts have called for the recognition of the land, territories and traditional knowledge of Indigenous peoples and local communities (IPLCs). Additionally, Indigenous advocates and allies are pushing to secure the free, prior and informed consent of IPLCs in conservation policies as key for the framework to succeed.

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30x30, biodiversity, COP15, Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous people, indigenous rightsSara Sheehyindigenous lands, Indigenous peoples, indigenous-led conservation, Indigenous rights, 30x30, COP15, biodiversity
Using Indigenous knowledge and Western science to address climate change impacts

Phys.org

June 8, 2022
Traditional Owners in Australia are the creators of millennia worth of traditional ecological knowledge—an understanding of how to live amid changing environmental conditions. Seasonal calendars are one of the forms of this knowledge best known by non-Indigenous Australians. But as the climate changes, these calendars are being disrupted.

How? Take the example of wattle trees that flower at a specific time of year. That previously indicated the start of the fishing season for particular species. Climate change is causing these plants to flower later. In response, Traditional Owners on Yuku Baja Muliku (YBM) Country near Cooktown are having to adapt their calendars and make new links.

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Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous led, restoration, climate changeMary PriceIndigenous knowledge, indigenous-led conservation, climate change, restoration
Climate fund aims to help indigenous people protect world's forests

Reuters

January 11, 2021
A global fund launched on Tuesday aims to boost climate financing to indigenous communities to help them secure land rights and preserve forested areas from the Congo Basin to the Andes, the initiative's backers said.

Governments, philanthropists and companies are expected to contribute to the Community Land Rights and Conservation Finance Initiative (CLARIFI), which will distribute funding among groups working to conserve forests and other ecosystems on the ground.

Over the last decade, less than 1% of international climate finance has gone to indigenous and local communities to manage forests that absorb planet-heating carbon emissions and are rich in biodiversity, but the new fund hopes to change that.

"For too long indigenous peoples and local communities have received shockingly little climate funding," said Stanley Kimaren ole Riamit, founder-director of Kenyan group Indigenous Livelihoods Enhancement Partners and a CLARIFI steering committee member. The fund will act as the "missing link" between donors that want to curb climate change and conserve biodiversity, and forest groups with the skills to do that, said Solange Bandiaky-Badji, coordinator of the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI), an NGO which is leading CLARIFI with the Campaign for Nature group.

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Campaign for Nature, finance, Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous people, indigenous rightsSara Sheehyindigenous lands, Indigenous rights, Indigenous peoples, Indigenous knowledge, Campaign for Nature, Finance
RRI and Campaign for Nature Launch CLARIFI – A New International Mechanism to Finance Community-led Action for Climate Change and Conservation 

Campaign for Nature

January 11, 2022
As the role played by Indigenous Peoples and local communities in safeguarding the planet gains long-due recognition by global climate and conservation initiatives, their representatives and allies have launched a new mechanism to finance locally-led efforts with full respect for the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities.

The Community Land Rights and Conservation Finance Initiative (CLARIFI), led by the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI) and Campaign for Nature (C4N), will mobilize and strategically deploy public and private funds to scale up the legal recognition of Indigenous Peoples’, Afro-descendant Peoples’, and local communities’ rights, as well as their efforts to strengthen their conservation of natural resources, traditional livelihoods, and gender justice.

About 1.8 billion Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities claim, inhabit and steward the earth’s most critical ecosystems, including its forests. Securing their rights and following their guidance is a powerful bottom-up opportunity to address the catastrophic threats facing the planet. For example, RRI estimates that 33% of the Earth’s tropical forest carbon is at risk without recognizing community rights to their lands. Securing these rights will avoid 1.1 to 7.4 GtC02e of emissions.

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Campaign for Nature, Indigenous people, indigenous rights, Indigenous knowledge, financeMary PriceIndigenous peoples, Indigenous rights, Campaign for Nature, Rights and Resources Initiative, Finance
'Indigenous people have the knowledge': Conservation biologist Erika Cuéllar on restoring the planet

CNN

November 1, 2021
An arid region of open forests and grasslands spanning three countries and more than a quarter of a million square miles, this is Gran Chaco. It's the second-largest forest in South America after the Amazon, but has long been neglected, suffering from deforestation, agricultural expansion and the effects of climate change.

When Bolivian conservation biologist Erika Cuéllar first saw the vast expanse in 1997, she was overcome by an urge to restore it. "I am very attracted to arid lands. When I was young, I was angry that nobody cared about dry lands and everybody cared about tropical rainforest," she says.

Despite looking open and empty, the area is teeming with unique vegetation and wildlife, from jaguars and ocelots to piranhas and vipers. It's also home to nine million people, including several indigenous communities.

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Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous people, indigenous rights, biodiversity, biodiversity loss, conservationSara SheehyIndigenous peoples, indigenous-led conservation, Indigenous knowledge, indigenous lands, biodiversity
Protecting human rights key to safeguarding nature

Thomson Reuters Foundation - OpEd

October 26, 2021
Last week, leaders from around the world came together at a global summit to negotiate a comprehensive plan to safeguard nature around the world. 

Whether the resulting global strategy, expected to be finalized in 2022, is sufficiently ambitious and successful will be influenced by one item: the degree to which countries put advancing human rights, in general, and the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities, in particular, at the heart of their plans and real actions.

Science has recently shown what many of us have always known, that indigenous peoples and local communities have historically been and still are the best stewards of nature. Biodiversity is declining less on indigenous lands and traditional territories than elsewhere in the world, and an outsized proportion of the world’s remaining biodiversity is found in these areas. 

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biodiversity, biodiversity loss, COP15, environmental justice, human rights, Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous people, indigenous rights, local communities, post-2020 GBF, UN CBDSara SheehyIndigenous rights, indigenous-led conservation, human rights, biodiversity
Funding, indigenous people key to success

New Strait Times

October 14, 2021
At a meeting of Parties to the United Nation's Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in the southern Chinese city of Kunming, world governments are looking ahead to the adoption of new goals and targets for nature to be met this decade: CBD's "Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework" (GBF).

The draft framework lays out broad actions to help transform society's relationship with biodiversity and fulfil a previously agreed shared vision of "living in harmony with nature" by 2050.

This week's online summit Part One sets the stage for a decisive face-to-face meeting in April. Among the new targets is one advanced by the Campaign for Nature (CFN): protect 30 per cent of the world's land and marine areas by 2030.

These should consist of protected areas and "other effective area-based conservation measures" (OECMs), such as territories inhabited by indigenous peoples and local communities (IPLCs).

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Indigenous people, indigenous rights, Indigenous knowledge, COP15, Campaign for Nature, 30x30, UN CBDMary PriceIndigenous peoples, Indigenous rights, indigenous lands, indigenous-led conservation, Indigenous knowledge, UN CBD, 30x30, Campaign for Nature, COP15
Conservation works better when local communities lead it, new evidence shows

The Conversation

October 7, 2021
We are currently facing a mass extinction of plants and animals. To remedy this, world leaders have pledged a huge expansion of protected areas ahead of the UN biodiversity summits to be held in October 2021 and May 2022 in Kunming, China.

The focus on how much of the planet to conserve overshadows questions of how nature should be conserved and by whom. In the past some conservation organisations have seen indigenous and local communities as undermining environmental conservation.

Our research strongly contradicts this. Our recent publication in Ecology and Society shows the best way to protect both nature and human wellbeing is for indigenous and local communities to be in control. That conclusion stems from examining examples of conservation projects carried out since 2000 and their results. Our international team of 17 scientists studied the effects on habitats and species and local communities.

We found improvements for conservation and people are much more likely when indigenous and local communities are environmental stewards. When in charge, local communities can establish a shared vision for conserving the environments they live in and for coexisting with wildlife. 

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Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous people, indigenous rights, conservation, natureMary Priceindigenous-led conservation, Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous peoples, Indigenous rights, conservation, Nature
Record $5bn donation to protect nature could herald new green era of giving

The Guardian

September 29, 2021
When their time comes, many of the richest people on Earth have committed to giving away the bulk of their fortunes. Education, poverty and the arts have traditionally benefited from philanthropy, attracting billions for important causes. But increasingly, nature and the climate crisis have become a focus of giving.

Last week, a group of nine philanthropic foundations made the largest ever donation to nature conservation, pledging $5bn to finance the protection of 30% of land and sea by the end of the decade. Swiss businessman Hansjörg Wyss, also a major donor to the US Democratic party, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos were among the billionaires behind the Protecting our Planet challenge. In effect, the money covers the estimated cost of the 30% goal for this decade, one of the 21 targets included in the draft Paris-style UN agreement for nature currently being negotiated. It also includes plans to eliminate plastics pollution and reduce pesticide use to slow species extinctions.

“We can solve the crisis facing nature,” Wyss said at the launch. “But it’s going to take the wealthiest nations and the wealthiest individuals committing to reinvest our enormous bounties here on Earth, safeguarding nature and protecting our lands, waters and wildlife.”

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30x30, finance, nature, Indigenous people, Indigenous knowledgeMary Price30x30, finance, nature, indigenous-led conservation, Indigenous peoples
Philanthropies pledge $5 billion to conserve nature worldwide

Antara News

September 28, 2021
Historic announcement follows ASEAN member states' calls for more funding for global biodiversity agreement

At a high-level event in the margins of the 76th session of the UN General Assembly, nine philanthropic organizations launched the "Protecting Our Planet Challenge" and pledged $5 billion to protect and conserve 30% of the planet by 2030 by supporting protected areas and Indigenous stewardship of their territories. This marks the largest-ever philanthropic commitment to nature conservation.

The science based 30x30 target has emerged as a central element of the Convention on Biological Diversity's draft 10-year strategy, which is expected to be approved at COP15 in Kunming, China in April 2022. Indigenous leaders welcomed the announcements as a sign of how the 30x30 target could be aligned with human rights.

Throughout the Convention on Biological Diversity negotiations, ASEAN member states have raised the important topic of biodiversity finance. A landmark study found that current global spending on biodiversity needs to increase by more than a factor of five in order to protect the most important biodiversity around the world.

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30x30, ASEAN, finance, Indigenous people, Indigenous knowledge, nature, UN General AssemblyMary Price30x30, finance, UN General Assembly, ASEAN, nature, indigenous-led conservation
World leaders pledge USD 5 billion to protect nature

Asia News International

September 23, 2021
Nine organisations have pledged 5 billion US dollars over the next ten years to support the creation, expansion, management and monitoring of protected and conserved areas of land, inland water and sea, working with indigenous peoples, local communities, civil society and governments, the United Nations said.

Heads of State, philanthropic leaders and indigenous representatives came together on Wednesday to announce unprecedented commitments to protect and restore nature at the opening session of the Nature for Life Hub, a high-level event Transformative Action for Nature and People, coinciding with the 76th United Nations General Assembly, according to the United Nations Development Programme.

“This is not a moment where we should not have hope. At the centre of all this, people will have to be the ones who shape what happens next,” Achim Steiner UNDP Administrator said here in a statement.

“Societies have found within themselves the ability to address things that often were long overdue whether it was the issues of inequality or exclusion, but also investments in systematic transformations. We are investing in one another’s ability to, together, change the trajectory of the world,” he added.

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30x30, finance, Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous people, nature, UN General AssemblyMary Price30x30, Finance, UN General Assembly, Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous peoples, indigenous-led conservation, Nature
Don’t be fooled, the biodiversity crisis is a global security crisis

African Arguments

September 23, 2021
Earlier this week, nine philanthropic organisations launched the “Protecting Our Planet Challenge” and pledged $5 billion to protect and conserve 30% of the planet by 2030 (30×30). This can be achieved by supporting protected areas and indigenous stewardship of their territories. This marks the largest-ever philanthropic commitment to nature conservation.

Whilst this may not naturally lead you to consider the implications for peace and security, this type of financial commitment could play an important role in the global effort to bring peace, prosperity and sustainability to the continent of Africa.

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30x30, finance, Indigenous people, Indigenous knowledge, nature, UN General Assembly, AfricaMary PriceAfrica, 30x30, UN General Assembly, Protecting Our Planet Challenge, Finance, indigenous-led conservation, indigenous lands, Indigenous peoples, Nature
International conservation effort gets $5B boost

E&E News

September 22, 2021
A coalition of nine charitable groups announced today that they will jointly commit $5 billion toward an aggressive pledge that aims to conserve 30% of the world’s lands and waters by 2030.

The pledge includes Amazon.com Inc. founder Jeff Bezos’ commitment on Monday to direct $1 billion — 10 percent of his $10 billion effort to address climate change — to the global conservation goal commonly known as 30×30 (Greenwire, Sept. 21).

Both the Rainforest Trust and the Wyss Foundation will likewise provide $500 million to the "Protecting Our Planet Challenge."

Additional funds come from the charitable fund Arcadia; Bloomberg Philanthropies; the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation; the Rob and Melani Walton Foundation; the indigenous rights nonprofit Nia Tero; and Re:wild, a group founded by conservation scientists and actor Leonardo DiCaprio.

“We can solve the crisis facing nature,” philanthropist Hansjörg Wyss said in a statement announcing the pledge. “But it’s going to take the wealthiest nations and the wealthiest individuals committing to reinvest our enormous bounties here on Earth, safeguarding nature and protecting our lands, waters, and wildlife.”

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30x30, finance, Indigenous people, Indigenous knowledge, nature, Wyss FoundationMary Price30x30, Finance, indigenous-led conservation, Nature
Philanthropists pledge record $5 billion to protect nature

Reuters

September 22, 2021
Philanthropists and investors committed $5 billion to nature restoration and conservation on Wednesday, a move environmental activists welcomed as the highest sum of private funding ever pledged.

The funding, pledged at an event on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, will focus on the "30by30" target, which aims to protect 30% of the planet's land and water over the next decade.

Scientists and conservationists say this is key to protecting biodiversity, which encompasses millions of species and natural processes in ecosystems such as rainforests and oceans, and is under threat from human-driven activities such as industrial agriculture, fishing, and greenhouse gas emissions.

Some $150 billion a year is currently pledged on conservation and so-called nature-positive initiatives that prevent degradation of nature but up to $1 trillion a year is needed to halt and reverse biodiversity loss, according to the Convention for Biodiversity, an intergovernmental U.N. agency that leads global biodiversity negotiations.

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30x30, finance, Indigenous people, Indigenous knowledge, natureMary Price30x30, Finance, nature, indigenous-led conservation