From Arctic Inuit to Pacific Islanders, indigenous peoples from 80 countries are meeting at a (pdf), this week to forge a common position on climate change. They want an official voice alongside national governments in upcoming negotiations to agree a successor to the Kyoto protocol.
The meeting is emphasising indigenous peoples鈥� histories of adapting to change. But beneath it is the fear that they will be trampled by rich countries trying to cut greenhouse emissions by managing indigenous lands.
鈥淚ndigenous peoples have contributed least to the global problems of climate change, but will almost certainly bear the greatest brunt of its impact,鈥� says Patricia Cochran, chair of the summit and head of the . Arctic peoples are hurting as sea ice changes and permafrost melts. The Yup鈥檌k village of Newtok, Alaska, is now moving to higher ground to escape storm surges unleashed by disappearing sea ice and another 26 villages in Alaska are similarly threatened.
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On the margins
A (pdf) by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature found that indigenous peoples are concentrated in the marginal lands likely to suffer most from climate change. Pastoralists such as Africa鈥檚 Samburu already suffer from drought, and islanders face dispossession by rising seas.
But of the United Nations University, which is helping to organise the Anchorage meeting, says indigenous peoples are also threatened because they are impoverished and have little political power or entitlement to their lands. Many feel their interests are not served by their national governments.
Culture shock
This makes some post-Kyoto plans to pay for cuts in greenhouse emissions worrying. Forest dwellers such as the Dayak tribe of Borneo or the pygmies of Cameroon fear they will be dispossessed by forest developers rushing to grab carbon credits by cutting and replanting trees.
Other indigenous peoples are already being displaced as foreign companies grab 鈥渦noccupied鈥� indigenous lands to plant biofuels or 鈥渃arbon offset鈥� trees to compensate for fossil fuel use elsewhere.
鈥淲e鈥檙e having the hardest time we鈥檝e faced in 500 years,鈥� says Dennis Martinez, an ecologist and O鈥檕dham (Pima) Indian at the meeting. He says indigenous peoples living off natural resources could be highly resilient to climate change 鈥� but not if their cultures are destroyed as the rest of the world tries to respond.
