A new data story based on a recent study by the FAO demonstrates how the forests of indigenous and tribal territories in Latin America are key for mitigating climate change and conserving biodiversity.
In some closing words to the Forum, Vicky Tauli-Corpuz (UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, United Nations) applauded the attention given to customary land tenure. For communities there has always been a struggle for their practices to be acknowledged, despite the fact that these existed long before the arrival of state governments. She found much promise in some of the legal work taking place in the Mekong region.
By Sônia Guajajara (Guajajara), Executive Coordinator for the Articulation of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil (APIB); Vicky Tauli-Corpuz (Kanakaney-Igorot), former UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples; Gregorio Mirabal (Wakuenai Kurripaco), General Coordinator of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon Basin (COICA); and Peter Seligmann, co-founder and CEO of Nia Tero.
In addition to its devastating toll on public health, COVID-19 has exacerbated global food insecurity and economic crises. These costs have been particularly acute for Indigenous Peoples and local communities on customarily governed territories and lands.
This blog was written by Sidi Munan as a column in the Borneo Post
Main photo: MPs from Sarawak should initiate a move to legislate for Sarawak in the case of native land rights. — Bernama file photo
For centuries, people around the world in the continents of Asia, Africa, Oceania and Latin America have been living off the forests and other natural resources to sustain their livelihoods, their cultural practices and sometimes even religious rituals.
Last month, India’s Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, issued the first 0.1 million Rural Property Cards (RPCs) to communities across more than 763 villages in six states in rural India under the SVAMITVA scheme.
The ability of the Embera villages in Panama to shut off the road into their community, and to exclude outsiders, is based in large measure on the government’s official recognition of their indigenous collective land rights.
We represent around five percent of the population of humanity, but we preserve around eighty-two percent of the world's biodiversity. We have a very important role in thinking about sustaining the life of the planet and this responsibility has fallen on us. We believe that if we do exactly with our way of life the protection of all humanity, it is also important that humanity guarantees the life of our people from the territory. When the territory dies, two deaths occur, his and our identity's, because the living body remains, but the tradition dies.
As a Swahili speaker from Tanzania, I have not often had the opportunity to meet or work with people from remote Maasai communities. However, I recently visited the villages of Naisinyai and Mundarara in the north of the country as part of a global research project on women’s land rights in pastoral communities affected by mining (the WOLTS project).
