Securing land rights is critical for realizing sustainable food systems that provide food security and overcome poverty. Security of property rights is central to preserving livelihoods, maintaining social stability, and increasing incentives for investment and for sustainable, productive land use.  

Indigenous Peoples globally have high exposure to environmental change and are often considered an ‘‘at-risk’’ population, although there is growing evidence of their resilience. Ample research illustrates that Indigenous Peoples are actively observing and adapting to change in a diversity of ways. In this webinar we examined the common factor affecting resilience to environmental change among Indigenous Peoples and local communities.

The Ford Foundation, the Land Portal Foundation, the Tenure Facility and the Thomson Reuters Foundation launched a webinar on May 20th on the the link between “environmental imbalances” and “emerging infectious diseases".  This is well established in literature; studies have shown that activities associated with deforestation, and subsequent biodiversity loss, contribute to the spread of disease vectors and associated diseases. Maintaining intact forest cover and preventing the associated consequences of deforestation, would reduce virus emergence events.

The Land Portal Foundation, the Tenure Facility, the Thomson Reuters Foundation and the Ford Foundation proposed a series of Land Dialogues promoting the centrality of Indigenous and community land rights in advancing global efforts to halt the climate crisis, achieving a healthy planet and forwarding the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

The dialogues focused on the importance of formally recognising and securing the customary lands of Indigenous Peoples and local communities as a crucial contribution to the overall climate health of the planet.

This webinar discusses women's land rights under customary tenure