By Amy Coughenour Betancourt, Cadasta President & CEO

This year, I attended my first Climate Week in NYC, held during the United Nations General Assembly, which is the largest annual climate event of its kind. Climate Week brings together over 400 events and activities attended by business leaders, policymakers, civil society representatives, and local stakeholders from countries around the globe. It intends to rally meaningful contributions still needed to halve carbon emissions by 2030 and be on a net-zero path by 2050. I was intent on finding ways to better understand the agenda, the status of actions being taken by the many actors, and how Cadasta could meaningfully contribute to this ambitious goal.

During the week, I attended many sessions at the top of Cadasta’s agenda: land, resource, and carbon rights of Indigenous Peoples, Local Communities, and Afro-descendant Peoples (IPs, LCs, and ADPs); the nature and status of climate finance and nature-based solutions; and efforts to scale partnerships and effective approaches to forest protection, consultative processes, and tenure rights. 

Two sessions are especially worth highlighting due to the strong presence of leaders from local, national, and global community IP, LC, and ADP organizations and alliances on the front lines of the climate crisis. 

The first was “Rights, Participation & Benefits for Indigenous Peoples & Local Communities,” organized by the Forest & Climate Leaders’ Partnership (FCLP) at the Ford Foundation. The FCLP was founded at COP26 by 26 “governments with partners committed to expanding and maintaining high-level political leadership on forests, land-use and climate.” The intent was to “work together to implement solutions that reduce forest loss, increase restoration and support sustainable development, and to ensure accountability for the pledges that have been made.” Cadasta is an implementing partner of one of the FCLP’s members, the UK government’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FDCO). 

The second was the 2023 Path to Scale (P2S) meeting of an informal network of donors, including the The Forest Tenure Funders Group (FTFG), rights holders’ groups, financial mechanisms, and partner organizations, co-organized by the Tenure Facility and Rights and Resources Initiative. The discussions focused on priorities and strategies to meet global climate and biodiversity targets. Strategies included scaling funding and other enabling factors to secure the land and resource rights, conservation, and livelihoods of IPs, LCs, and ADPs. 

Here are three key takeaways from the rich discussion and sharing of best practices, progress, and gaps in these efforts:

There is growing recognition of the role of Indigenous and Local Community land tenure in the fight against climate change.

This was evident in the many sessions that included Indigenous and local voices. Equally compelling is the rapidly expanding body of evidence presented by the Tenure Facility on the clear links between land tenure and climate and biodiversity outcomes. At least 20+ new academic studies published in the last eight months in respected journals and publications have demonstrated reduced deforestation, increased biodiversity, improved health, and a number of other positive outcomes on IP and LC-held and titled land. These studies are critical to increasing investment in rights holders to map, document, and secure land titles. The studies are also key to improving the enabling environment for community land governance and building protection against the many rights violations committed by both legal and illegal actors.

Funding and structural gaps are still a barrier to progress.

While some progress is being made on funding commitments to support community land tenure, protection of rights, and support for ecosystem services, critical gaps remain. For example, still only 7% of the $1.7 billion IP & LC Forest Tenure Pledge made by 22 donors at COP26 has been channeled directly to IP and LC-led organizations. The 2023 INDUFOR report titled “Forging Resilient Pathways” confirmed this sobering figure in last week’s presentation. 

While significant investment is being channeled into carbon infrastructure, there are minimal resources supporting participation, capacity, and protocols for local community stakeholders and forest stewards. Without targeted investment, local communities cannot equitably benefit from the billions of dollars funneled to governments and the private sector. 

There are major cultural, legal, inclusion, and financing gaps in markets that have not adequately protected Indigenous Peoples’ rights to Free, Prior, Informed Consent (FPIC) before any investment takes place on their land, including the development of projects that produce carbon credits. To address these gaps, climate philanthropy—which is better positioned to build partner capacity and buy down risk for larger bilateral and private sector investors—has grown over the last two years, but much more needs to be done to tip the balance toward more direct funding.

The global leadership of Indigenous Peoples (IP), Afro-descendant Peoples (ADP), and Local Community (LC) organizations and their innovative approaches to climate finance are on the rise.

One of the most exciting developments during Climate Week was witnessing the growing leadership of IP, ADP, and LC-led efforts to create new national, regional, and global direct funding mechanisms. These include Shandia, led by the Global Alliance of Territorial Communities (GATC), which is a global platform working through regional and national funds; the Mesoamerican Territorial Fund, led by the Mesoamerican Alliance of Peoples and Forests (AMBP); the Indigenous Peoples’ of Asia Solidarity Fund with 26 regional partners; and Nustantara, led by three national alliances of Indonesian Indigenous Peoples, AMAN, KPA, and WALHI. Efforts are underway in Brazil, led by APIB, a national Indigenous alliance; the Congo Basin, led by the Central African alliance REPALEAC; and Pawanka Fund, which was founded in 2014 and supports Indigenous and local communities globally.

I came away from Climate Week with a mix of hope, cautious optimism, and fear that things are not moving quickly enough to benefit frontline communities and reach critical climate targets. There is an urgency around these and other efforts to reverse the terrifying pace of forest loss and negative climate impacts. 

Yet, I also returned energized about the contributions that Cadasta can make. Through our FCDO-funded Land for Climate and Forest Rights initiative, Cadasta will allocate direct financial and technical support to 12 partner organizations fighting for IP, LC, and ADP forest rights across at least 12 jurisdictions around the world. As an ally, Cadasta will continue to amplify and support the aspirations and plans of local peoples fighting to protect ancestral lands and resources, and we urge others to do the same.