The vast majority of countries overlook or insufficiently involve Indigenous people and local communities (IPLCs) when drawing up biodiversity action plans, despite a large body of evidence that including them makes for far more effective nature conservation strategies, a report has found.
Fewer than a third of countries engaged with IPLCs when drawing up their latest National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs), environmental consultancies Climate Focus and Parabukas found in their Forest Declaration Assessment report, released this week.
They carried out high-level assessments of 27 NBSAPs from countries with a significant IPLC presence as well as in-depth assessments of Australia, Brazil, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Madagascar, Mexico, the Philippines, and Sweden.
“Only one-third of assessed NBSAPs include provisions for strengthening IPs’ and/or LCs’ rights, despite the overwhelming evidence that this is among the most effective biodiversity conservation strategies,” the report said.
It found that while more than two-thirds included strategies to recognise Indigenous and traditional knowledge, they focused more on documentation than protecting knowledge rights or implementation.
As well, fewer than half the plans listed IPLCs as full and equal partners, none of them had clear safeguards to protect IPLC rights, and while some countries were eager to involve Indigenous and local voices, limited budgets or timeframes often get in the way.
The findings raise concerns as IPLCs effectively protect and manage 80% of the world’s remaining biodiversity, and serve as a warning to the fledgling market in biodiversity credits to involve IPLCs as well as host country governments in project development.
In the carbon market, there have been a number of examples of Indigenous peoples and local communities not just ignored but impacted negatively by projects.
“The good news: we have a golden opportunity to change this,” Darragh Conway, report co-author and lead legal counsel at Climate Focus, said in a comment on LinkedIn.
“Countries are right now updating their plans to meet the 2030 global biodiversity targets. By putting a rights-based approach at the heart of these plans, they stand a far better chance of achieving lasting change in how we interact with nature.”
DO BETTER
Climate Focus and Parabukas outlined a number of recommendations for governments, donors and partners, and IPLCs themselves on step they could take to improve the situation in the current round of NBSAP preparations.
“In most cases, governments are the primary authors and implementers of NBSAPs. In this role, governments hold great responsibility to engage IPs and LCs as full and equal partners in biodiversity conservation,” the report said.
Government responsibilities would include committing to allocating sufficient resources to adequately involve IPLCs, acknowledging and supporting the value of their non-monetary contributions such as knowledge, labour, time, and skills, and developing NBSAP targets and actions specifically aimed at securing IPLC tenure rights.
National biodiversity plans should include indicators and monitoring measures that track progress on IPLC-linked targets, and include safeguards that ensure all biodiversity conservation measures, including the establishment and expansion of protected areas, fully respect IPLC rights.
Donors and partners, meanwhile, should ensure IPLCs have direct access to finance and provide financial resources to support extensive consultation processes.
They should also advocate for governments to include IPLCs, and ensure their rights, livelihoods, traditional knowledge, and unique roles are recognised, respected, and enhanced across biodiversity and climate finance programmes, the report urged.
On their side, IPLCs and their organisations can strengthen their national representative bodies, build national and international partnerships, engage with the International Indigenous Forum on Biodiversity, ensure the inclusion of frequently marginalised groups such as women, youth, and remote communities, and demand compensation for their contributions, the report said.
By Stian Reklev –stian@carbon-pulse.com
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