Indigenous Peoples and the Frontlines of Climate Action

agranelli3
14 hours ago
6 min read

The climate crisis is here, and it's hitting hardest in the places least responsible for causing it. Across the globe, Indigenous Peoples are among those most affected, despite being some of the world's most effective stewards of nature. They make up just 6% of the population but care for over 40% of the planet's most ecologically intact lands. Indigenous-managed lands overlap with 36% of the world's remaining intact forests, ecosystems critical to stabilizing our climate. These forests alone could provide nearly a third of the emissions cuts needed by 2050 to keep global warming below 2°C.

Yet, Indigenous voices remain largely sidelined in the rooms where decisions are made.

The Cost of Being Ignored

For thousands of years, Indigenous communities have lived in balance with the natural world. Their traditional knowledge systems, called by the UN "scientific and technical", offer time-tested ways to manage forests, grow food, and care for water sources. Agroforestry, rotational farming, water harvesting, and seed saving are just a few of the practices and fundamental climate strategies that help restore biodiversity and store carbon.

The ICCA Consortium estimates that approximately 25% of the planet's land is under Indigenous and community stewardship. These areas are often better protected than state-run parks, precisely because they are cared for by people with a deep cultural connection to the land. But here's the challenge: most of these territories lack formal legal recognition. Indigenous and local communities often do not hold secure land titles or legal standing over the territories they have stewarded for generations.

Without legal recognition, these communities are vulnerable to land grabs, industrial exploitation, and exclusion from conservation or development planning. This legal invisibility also limits their ability to access climate finance, assert Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC)—the right of Indigenous Peoples to give or withhold consent to projects that affect their lands, resources, and livelihoods, based on adequate information, without coercion, and before any actions are taken, and protect their rights in court.

Recognizing and securing collective land tenure through national laws, constitutional reforms, or international frameworks is essential for protecting both human rights and biodiversity. This lack of legal recognition leaves Indigenous Peoples wide open to exploitation, whether through land grabs, industrial development, or even well-meaning conservation initiatives that displace the very people who've preserved these ecosystems for generations.

And when Indigenous territories are threatened, it's not only biodiversity at risk. In these places, the consequences of environmental degradation are felt first and hardest, often magnified by poverty, marginalization, and exclusion from decision-making.

And when people are displaced from ancestral lands, the psychological impact—grief, disorientation, and disconnection—can be as devastating as the physical loss itself.

The consequences ripple through every aspect of community life, especially health, culture, and well-being. Climate change disrupts traditional diets and food systems, reducing access to nutrient-rich, locally grown foods and medicinal plants, worsening nutrition and health outcomes. It also threatens clean water sources, increasing the risk of waterborne diseases.

At the cultural level, it erodes cultural identity, disrupts spiritual practices, and threatens the very essence of community life by preventing ceremonies, harvesting cycles, or rituals tied to specific seasons and places. And when people are displaced from ancestral lands, the psychological impact—grief, disorientation, and disconnection—can be as devastating as the physical loss itself.

When sacred sites are flooded, when traditional medicines disappear, or when young people are forced to leave their homelands, the loss isn't just economic. It lingers in the stories that go untold, in the rituals that can no longer be performed. A 2023 submission by Indigenous civil society groups to the UNFCCC described these losses with painful clarity: language, ceremony, and ancestral knowledge slipping away due to climate disruption.

The Flip Side of Climate Solutions

At times, some climate solutions are causing more harm than good. Large-scale tree-planting, carbon offset programs, or bioenergy projects may look good on paper, but on the ground, they can have the effect of displacing Indigenous communities or blocking access to lands they've relied on for generations.

What's needed instead are Indigenous-led pathways grounded in Buen Vivir, living in harmony with each other and the Earth.

Top-down climate action, if done without consultation and consent, can replicate the very injustices it aims to fix. What's needed instead are Indigenous-led pathways grounded in Buen Vivir, living in harmony with each other and the Earth.

Indigenous people restore degraded areas.

Climate finance is another priority. Even when funding is available, it rarely reaches Indigenous-led initiatives. Despite playing a central role in protecting global biodiversity, Indigenous Peoples receive less than 1% of climate-related aid. They are often shut out by complex application processes, eligibility rules that don't fit their realities, and decision-making boards where they have no seat. At COP28, for example, Indigenous leaders were excluded from board-level decisions on the new Loss and Damage Fund, a fund that exists because of the harms communities like theirs have long endured.

So what does real inclusion look like? It starts with recognizing Indigenous Peoples not just as participants, but as decision-makers.

Participation That's Real, Not Symbolic

True climate justice means Indigenous Peoples must be part of shaping solutions, not just included for optics. That means recognizing them as rights-holders. It means changing the systems that decide who gets a voice.

Participation has to be meaningful. Indigenous leaders need a real say in climate negotiations, funding decisions, and national adaptation plans. This includes not only elders and traditional leaders, but also women and youth who sustain cultural memory and drive innovation. And Indigenous-led monitoring and research must be respected, not sidelined in favor of Western metrics alone.

The 2025 UN report, State of the World's Indigenous Peoples, calls for a fundamental shift in the architecture of climate finance. That includes the creation of Indigenous-led financial mechanisms, formal recognition of Indigenous governance systems, and the protection of data sovereignty, ensuring Indigenous communities control how knowledge about their lands and livelihoods is collected and used.

Indigenous Women and Youth: Carrying the Fire Forward

Indigenous women are the backbone of community resilience. They share climate knowledge, manage food systems, care for water, and lead efforts to restore forests and fight extractive industries. But Indigenous women also face the compounding pressures of land dispossession, ecological degradation, and increased exposure to gender-based violence, especially when forced to migrate due to climate disasters.

When we support Indigenous women and girls by listening to their priorities, protecting their rights, and funding their leadership, we multiply the impact of every climate solution.

Women are also more likely to be left out of decision-making processes, even as their workloads increase due to the impacts of climate change. The erosion of customary governance systems, often replaced by centralized or patriarchal models, further limits women's access to land and voice in decisions. This loss not only diminishes women's status but also weakens the community's collective resilience.

When we support Indigenous women and girls by listening to their priorities, protecting their rights, and funding their leadership, we multiply the impact of every climate solution. The same goes for Indigenous youth. Across Mesoamerica, young people are learning from elders while innovating with technology and advocacy. They are the future, but also the present, and they need to be resourced accordingly.

From the Forests of Mesoamerica: What Partnership Looks Like

EcoLogic Development Fund partners with rural and Indigenous communities across Mexico and Central America to help them sustainably manage the ecosystems they depend on.

Slash-and-burn agriculture, monocropping, and unsustainable development are becoming more common, often out of economic necessity. These practices degrade land and reduce food security, creating a feedback loop of poverty and ecological harm. EcoLogic works alongside communities to break that cycle. We support solutions that honor traditional knowledge, respect cultural heritage, and generate sustainable livelihoods.

This intergenerational model—rooted in customary governance—has helped restore degraded areas without compromising cultural practices.

In the highlands of Totonicapán, the ancestral authorities of the 48 Cantones have protected their communal forest for centuries. When climate change brought longer droughts and more frequent fires, the community expanded its traditional patrols and trained youth brigades to monitor forest health. Through EcoLogic’s partnership, young leaders now work alongside elders to manage reforestation plots with native species like aliso and pinabete. This intergenerational model—rooted in customary governance—has helped restore degraded areas without compromising cultural practices. It’s a model of what Indigenous-led climate adaptation looks like in action.

In the Chinantla region of Oaxaca, women’s groups are leading efforts to replace smoky, fuel-intensive cookstoves with efficient models that reduce firewood use by up to 60%. Paired with home gardens using heirloom seeds, these innovations have improved health, strengthened food sovereignty, and reduced pressure on surrounding forests. But the deeper impact is cultural: women are revitalizing traditional planting cycles, sharing ancestral recipes with youth, and re-establishing knowledge pathways that had begun to fade under environmental and economic stress.

What Justice Really Means

Indigenous Peoples aren't asking to be saved. They're asking to be heard. They're asking for their rights, their knowledge, and their leadership to be respected.

We already know that their lands store more carbon, that their forests are more intact, and that their governance systems are more sustainable. We have the science, the stories, and the policy frameworks. What's missing is the political will—and the humility—to follow their lead.

Supporting Indigenous Peoples means more than inviting them to speak. It means stepping back, sharing power, and resourcing their solutions. It means protecting the guardians of the Earth, not just because it's ethical, but because our future depends on it.

Recognition, not rescue. Self-determination, not tokenism. These are the foundations for real, lasting climate action.

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