Recognition of indigenous lands poses technical and political challenges to nine Amazonian countries

Manaus, august 18.- Indigenous lands tenure in the nine Amazon basin countries and the resources related to them were among the issues discussed in depth on the third day of the Indigenous Amazonian Regional Summit that has been taking place since the beginning of the week in Manaus, in the state of Amazonas, Brazil. Various indigenous, environmental and social organisations, participating in one of the specific working groups, discussed the question of how traditional Pan-Amazonian Indigenous Peoples can have their rights to the lands they have lived in for centuries respected.

Technical advisor to the Coordination of Indigenous Organisations Amazon Basin (COICA), Valentim Muiba, explained why it is so important to defend indigenous lands. “To us, the land is our home, our market place and our pharmacy. It is there we are born, grow, find our sustenance and extract our medicines. Indigenous Peoples cannot live apart from their lands. There is a powerful cultural identification between an Indigenous individual and the place where he was born”, he declared.

Valentim moderated the presentations and considerations of the working group and made reference to current problems in Bolivia and Peru, where indigenous lands are being threatened by large-scale ventures. Generally speaking the indigenous populations in the Pan-Amazonian region still face great difficulty in having their land rights formally recognised.

In turn, those territories that have been officialised have very weak defensive or protective structures available and are easy prey for big mining and infrastructure projects and highly susceptible to the occurrence of environmental crimes. Cases like the Belo Monte Hydroelectric plant, in Brazil, the Vila Tanuria–Santo Ignacio de Moxos highway in Bolivia, and the big oil spills in indigenous areas in Peru are concrete examples of such problems.

Contributions to be made

COICA, with the support of the Coordination of Indigenous Organisations of the Brazilian Amazon (COIAB), is the organisation behind this unprecedented initiative bringing together around 110 indigenous leaderships from the nine Amazon countries. Since Monday (Aug. 15) there have been debates in the form of panels and working groups, on issues like climate change, “REDD+”, carbon market and ancestral wisdom.

Representing the Amerindian Peoples Association of Guyana (APA), Laurence Anselmo stated that in his country there was a lack of definition that was anguishing for all the indigenous peoples there. “Around 13.9% of the country is formed by Indigenous Peoples lands but the government does not recognise that. Even though we have been living in them for centuries there is still no legal definition as to who are the owners of the lands and who are the beneficiaries of their resources. We want to take part in this debate, we have a contribution to make and we will not be accept being excluded”, declared the leader.

WWF Network took part in this working group. Cláudio Maretti, leader of the ‘Living Amazon Initiative’ made a presentation of the initiative explaining it and sharing with the group proposals for consolidating the theme “territories” in terms of its nature conservation functions in an alliance with environmental organisations and in a Pan-Amazonian perspective.

"The indigenous organisations need to seek out partners. That is already being done to some extent but it needs to expanded much more. The organisations need make explicit and scientifically demonstrated their contributions to the big environmental issues like climate change, water resources and biodiversity”, said the specialist.

Cláudio Maretti advised the Indigenous Groups to be present and raise their voices at the big international meetings, demonstrating how much they contribute to global priorities and at the same time claiming and asserting their rights. He suggested that the indigenous organisations should be more pro-active and present studies and proposals at the Rio+ 20, which will be taking place in Brazil in June next year, and at the World Conservation Congress in South Korea, also scheduled for 2012.

Again according to Maretti, the WWF Living Amazon initiative would like to find ways of providing support for studies on the conservation role played by indigenous lands and their contributions to the achievement of the goals and targets of the various global conventions.

"Indigenous Conservation Territory"

Gonzalo Oviedo, of the IUCN - International Union for the Conservation of Nature, stated that it was important to need to harmonise the needs associated to indigenous lands throughout the Amazon basin. “We need to transform these actions into activities with a more Amazonian character and less concentrated on the specific issues of the individual countries”, he insisted.

Gonzalo reminded participants of the need to acquire “a better understanding’ of the protection provided for isolated indigenous groups.”It is something that takes place a lot but it has hardly been documented at all”, he said.

He also defended the idea that the indigenous peoples should be more pro-active in elaborating projects of their own interest. “The indigenous people themselves should be elaborating the protocols and special measures to serve as reference material in addressing this issue” he explained.

In the same working group the idea was ventilated of the possibility of using the concept of an “Indigenous Conservation Territory”. According to Maretti, this is a new concept in relation to protected areas governance, called for by Indigenous Groups and first voiced in 2007 at the Latin American Protected Areas Congress in Bariloche, Argentina and later formalised at the World Conservation Congress in Barcelona, Spain, in 2008.

The concept contemplates the integration of all the concepts associated to natural resource management and Nature, together with the cosmological visions and the socio-cultural and economic reproduction of indigenous peoples, instead of treating them as separate sets of concepts as is done in the governance models adopted by present day protected areas systems in the respective countries.

According to Maretti, the guidelines governing the protection of nature that orientate the national programmes and international agreements should not restrict the identification of priorities to the criteria of official science alone but should also incorporate the culturally differentiated conservation interests of specific groups like local communities and indigenous peoples.

Programme sequence

The third day of the Amazonian summit was dedicated to working groups. In addition to territorial issues ("Indigenous lands, Living Prospects and Protected Areas") there were three other groups discussing the great issues that currently have an impact on the existence of indigenous peoples in the nine Amazonian countries.

The other groups were entitled ‘Climate Crisis, Forests and Indigenous REDD+’, ‘Ancestral Wisdom, People and a Full Life in Harmony with Nature’. and ‘Influence and Communication in Indigenous Rights’. There was an extra group promoted by the Brazilian government to discuss the Brazilian experience in defining safeguards for indigenous people in regard to climate change and REDD+ possibilities.

Thursday, August 18, is the last day of the great Amazonian Regional Summit. The working groups are going to present the results of their discussions and resolutions addressing the Pan-Amazonian sphere will be adopted in regard to climate change, REDD+, the Indigenous Amazon and Rio+20.