Mongabay
June 4, 2021
Nature-based solutions to tackle the climate crisis, specifically through the global carbon market, are attracting major public and private investment. Yet, according to new research by the NGO Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI) and Canada’s McGill University, most tropical forested countries looking to benefit from these markets still need to define the rights of Indigenous peoples, local communities and Afro-descendant peoples over carbon in their customary lands and territories.
If these rights are not meaningfully recognized, the researchers argue, the viability of these nature-based solutions will be fundamentally threatened.
RRI has tracked the land rights of Indigenous communities throughout the world for two decades. This latest research is in the context of a global task force established to rapidly expand voluntary carbon markets. Major international corporations like Amazon, Unilever, Salesforce, Airbnb and Nestlé, as part of the LEAF coalition, are pushing to mobilize at least $1 billion using Architecture for REDD+ Transactions (ART) to tackle deforestation and forest degradation.