Indigenous Communities Protect The Amazon
By Guest Contributor
Published3 hours ago
About 1.5 million Indigenous people reside in the forests of the Amazon in South America. Although deforestation and fires have eaten into this iconic forest in recent decades, Indigenous communities are helping protect some of its most intact parts.
Standing, healthy forests breathe in carbon dioxide and store it in their trunks, limbs and roots. But if trees decompose after being cut or burn during a fire, they return that carbon to the atmosphere. Although the Amazon is still a net carbon sink — capturing 100 million metric tons more carbon dioxide per year than it emits — it is on the brink of becoming a net carbon source. Over the past 50 years, an estimated 17 percent of the Amazon’s forests have been lost.
The map above shows Indigenous-managed territories in the Amazon River basin, which includes portions of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Peru, Suriname, and Venezuela. About 385 Indigenous groups reside on about 2.4 million square kilometers of Amazonia. A growing body of research indicates that these groups are defenders against deforestation, protecting some of the most carbon-rich parts of the Amazon.
“Indigenous communities are unsung heroes of conservation, and many actively monitor their forests,” said Peter Veit, who is a senior fellow at World Resources Institute (WRI).
Veit led research published in January 2023, which found that forests managed by Indigenous people and other communities between 2001 and 2021 were carbon sinks, whereas forests not managed by Indigenous people and other communities were on average net carbon sources.
More:
https://cleantechnica.com/2023/10/10/indigenous-communities-protect-the-amazon/