Amazon Protection Depends on Indigenous Land Rights
Author
Flora Campello
Date Published
The Amazon, the world's biggest rainforest, plays an essential role in global climate balance and the maintenance of biodiversity.
However, the quick advance of deforestation and illegal activity has been threatening not only our planet, but also the Indigenous Peoples who live and have been preserving this region for countless generations.
Protecting the native people is fundamental since their presence and way of life are pillars of environmental conservation and of the defense of the forest.
It is important to highlight that Indigenous lands are among the most preserved areas of the Amazon, which demonstrates the important role of the Indigenous Peoples as true keepers of the forest. The Native Peoples and nearby communities can coexist peacefully with the forest thanks to traditional knowledge about agroforestry practices, low-impact hunting, controlled burning, and surveillance. With deforestation rates two to three times lower than non-Indigenous lands, Indigenous territories are climate hotspots.
Besides that, the ancestral wisdom of the Indigenous People represents a heritage of great relevance for the future of the Amazon and, consequently, our planet. Their knowledge of plants, animals, soil, and climate cycles is essential to the contribution of effective forest management and to the conservation of biodiversity. Still, the ongoing issue regarding land demarcation and the active violence against these communities weaken this relationship, allowing illegal activities such as (but not limited to!) gold mining, land grabs, and oil drilling, which intensify environmental degradation.
Brazil’s Marco Temporal Threatens Indigenous Land Rights
Political forces, such as Brazil's Marco Temporal proposal (a legal thesis that argues that Indigenous Peoples are only entitled to the demarcation of their traditional lands if they were occupying those lands on October 5th, 1988), weaken environmental protections and freeze land demarcation processes. This leads to displacement, assassination of leaders, and destruction of forests. The Marco Temporal is unfair as it sets an arbitrary deadline that ignores centuries of displacement and makes it difficult for communities to prove their rightful connection to ancestral land. In September 2023, Brazil’s Supreme Court rejected this proposal, allowing the Indigenous People to have rights to their ancestral lands regardless of their physical presence. However, legislators have put forth bills to delay this decision.
Thousands of people thronged the streets of the Amazonian city of Belem, Brazil COP30 - 2025
©AYELE Projects
In conclusion, land rights for Indigenous communities in the Amazon are essential as this allows them to lawfully protect their ancestral lands. The demarcation of land is critical to recognizing these rights and to ensure that they also have legal standing. This allows Indigenous Peoples to defend their land against threats which include deforestation and mining.
Therefore, it is vital that the Brazilian government strengthen the policies for demarcation and monitoring of territories in order to combat illegal activities that put these communities, the forest, and the entire planet at risk. In this way, nature can be preserved and a more balanced future for the next generations is ensured.
In the following Global Citizen article, the authors explore why Indigenous land rights are essential to protecting the Amazon and stabilizing our planet. The piece highlights how Indigenous stewardship, ancestral knowledge, and legal recognition of territories are central to defending the forest against environmental destruction, political threats, and violent land grabs.
The World Economic Forum and Indigenous leaders Network highlight how Amazon peoples protect biodiversity and climate, rebalancing humanity with Earth
Scientific NASA'S studies prove how Indigenous communities protect the Amazon rainforest, the planet’s carbon sink, sustaining life, climate balance.