A spatial overview of the global importance of Indigenous lands for conservation

Abstract

Understanding the scale, location and nature conservation values of the lands over which Indigenous Peoples exercise traditional rights is central to implementation of several global conservation and climate agreements. However, spatial information on Indigenous lands has never been aggregated globally. Here, using publicly available geospatial resources, we show that Indigenous Peoples manage or have tenure rights over at least ~38 million km 2 in 87 countries or politically distinct areas on all inhabited continents. This represents over a quarter of the world's land surface, and intersects about 40% of all terrestrial protected areas and ecologically intact landscapes (e.g. boreal and tropical primary forests, savannas and marshes). Our results add to growing evidence that recognizing Indigenous Peoples' rights to land, benefit sharing, and institutions is essential to meeting local and global conservation goals. The geospatial analysis presented here indicates that collaborative partnerships involving conservation practitioners, Indigenous Peoples and governments would yield significant benefits for conservation of ecologically valuable landscapes, ecosystems and genes for future generations.

Importance of Indigenous Peoples’ lands for the conservation of Intact Forest Landscapes

“…Geospatial data for the world's administrative areas were sourced from the 2015 Global Administrative Areas (GADM) spatial database v2 (http://gadm.org/version2); GADM data were used by Garnett et al . () to define administrative areas for mapping Indigenous Peoples’ lands and their role in conservation, and by Potapov et al . () for assessing IFL reduction over the period 2000–2013.…”

Closing the Gap and the Sustainable Development Goals: listening to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people

“…Language loss is associated with biodiversity loss, so Australia's rapid losses of both languages and biodiversity are interrelated manifestations of colonisation. 29 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people currently manage about 4.02 million km 2 of Australia's 7.17 million km 2 , including 930,000 km 2 of high-level protected land. 26,27 Protection of biodiversity constitutes SDG 14: Life on Land and SDG 15: Life below Water, which are affected by the loss of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people's relationships with lands and waters.…”

“…25 The removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people from their Country and practices of land care contribute to ongoing losses of biodiversity. 29 One of the main barriers to greater opportunities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to care for Country is access to land, another impact of ongoing colonisation. 28 Land management by indigenous people can ensure conservation of biodiversity at global, national and regional scales.…”

Governance principles for community‐centered conservation in the post‐2020 global biodiversity framework

“…Tensions remain among "natural protectionists" strongly advocating a "people-free" protected areas (PAs) approach (e.g., Oates, 2006;Terborgh, 1999;Terborgh & Peres, 2017), and "social conservationists" supporting various forms of sustainable use, with associated elements of poverty alleviation and social justice (e.g., Brechin, Wilshusen, Fortwangler, & West, 2003;Brockington, Duffy, & Igoe, 2010;West, Igoe, & Brockington, 2006). Furthermore, a substantial proportion of the world's biodiversity remains outside conservation enclosures (see Jones et al, 2018), or is largely aligned with Indigenous territories (e.g., Garnett et al, 2018;Gullison & Hardner, 2018;Schuster, Germain, Bennett, Reo, & Arcese, 2019). However, as Brechin et al (2003) have noted efforts to protect nature are also very much a "social enterprise."…”