How can the new Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) be a tool for strengthening rights-based forest protection and increased funding for indigenous peoples?   

 
Program: 
 
Rights-based rainforests management as a key to protect biodiversity: finding workable solutions.   
Speaker: Silvana Bustillo Restrepo, Rainforest Foundation Norway (RFN)

Experiences from Brazil: Protecting the Amazon rainforest through Indigenous Management Plans.    
Speaker: Marivelton Barroso, president of the Federation of indigenous org in Rio Negro (FOIRN), Brazil. 

Scaling up indigenous management in DR Congo: Presenting solutions for rights-based protection of large contiguous forests.  
Speaker: Joseph Itongwa, ANAPAC, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)

 
Panel: How can the Global Biodiversity Framework boost concrete results for rights-based forest protection and increased finance?  

• Will Lockhart, Head of UK's CBD Delegation, Deputy Director for International Environment Negotiations, 
• Felipe Guerra, Specialized Professional from National Natural Parks of Colombia  
• Joji Carino, Ibaloi-Igorot People of Philippines, Forest Peoples Program
• Kevin Currey, Program officer, Ford Foundation (on videolink)
• Harold Rincon, coordinator of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon (COICA)
• Gaute Voigt Hanssen, Head of Norway’s CBD Delegation, Ministry of Climate and Environment 
  
  Moderator: Borghild Tønnessen-Krokan, Rainforest Foundation Norway,
  
  This event has interpretations in French, Spanish, Portuguese and English. 

Online registration, for external viewers:  https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScmub6QAfCmayRSqfyIUaCT_dNsKYdz4aq1xQKFs0aeC_OWCA/viewform

Streaming (will only work once event has started): https://broadcaster.interactio.eu/join/tws2-bri4-xpfp
 

Concept: 

One of the key elements in a new Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) will be how the frameworks’ goals, targets and implementation system can incentivize practical biodiversity solutions on the ground. There is a large overlap between indigenous peoples’ areas and areas with very high biodiversity, both in tropical forests and other biodiversity rich ecosystems. How can a new GBF best support the key role and respect the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities (IPLC)? In this side-event we want to present examples from rainforest countries, which –when scaled up- have the potential to make globally significant contributions to the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. 

Key questions in the discussion will be how the new agreement and its implementation mechanisms should be formulated to ensure support and enhancement of IPLC contributions. We see significant opportunities for using scant public and private resources in ways that can address the climate and biodiversity crises together, and opportunities to build on significant pledges already made at COP26 of the UNFCCC. We will also bring in funding agencies, to get their perspective on how a new GBF best can incentivize increased funding for IPLC solutions. 

The purpose is to come up with concrete input to formulations in the new GBF, as well as its implementation and monitoring systems, ensuring the rights of indigenous peoples and building actions and programs on their vast experience and knowledge in sustainable forest management, not only in area-based conservation targets but across the GBF.  

Rainforest Foundation Norway (RFN), Forest Peoples Programme (FPP) and the Government of Norway have long experience in bringing actors from different sectors of society together – policy, finance, industry, indigenous peoples, CSOs –and are certain that this can lead to unexpected concrete suggestions and solutions needed now. 

 

Background 

The carbon rich tropical rainforest hosts more than half the world’s terrestrial species and millions of indigenous people. It regulates the climate and provides us with food, water, medicines, and services we need. Unfortunately, the world’s rainforests are severely threatened. So are its guardians.  

A 2021 study by Rainforest Foundation Norway found that a third of tropical rainforest area has been lost, while another third is degraded, leaving only one third intact. Protecting and restoring what remains must be central to solving the twin climate and biodiversity crises. 

Evidence shows that tropical rainforests are best protected when the communities living in the forests have recognized land rights that are respected by the outside world. Despite this, Indigenous peoples and local communities’ rights and solutions are too often not recognized, and many are threatened. Furthermore, their tenure and forest management initiatives only receive fractions of global climate funds according to the “Falling Short“ report by the Rainforest Foundation Norway from 2021. This represents a missed opportunity for the world's rainforest and the vast number of species they harbour. 

Securing tenure rights and increased support for indigenous-led forest protection is however not enough. We see increasingly how deforestation, degradation and effects of climate change affect forests outside indigenous territories, putting whole ecosystems and thousands of people at risk. Indigenous peoples should have a stronger voice in the design of land-use plans for large contiguous forests. 

In the largest amount of forest funding ever pledged, at UNFCCC COP26 in November, world leaders and finance contributors committed to saving the world's tropical rainforests, ending deforestation by 2030 and increasing the support for forest protection by Indigenous peoples and local communities. It comes at a crucial time for the world’s rainforests, with the potential to speed up necessary action from governments, companies, and all of society.