New detailed maps from GATC and Earth Insight show the overlap of industrial projects on ancestral territories in the Amazon and Mesoamerica, driving a global demand for territorial rights and direct financing in indigenous tropical forests.
An international coalition of native communities and local groups, spanning from Mesoamerica to the Amazon basin, has consolidated a common front to demand the guarantee of their territorial rights and direct access to financing. This mobilization arises after the publication of a comprehensive analysis that maps, for the first time on a global scale, the pressure exerted by the extractivism model in tropical forests on their inhabitants.
The study, jointly developed by Earth Insight and the Global Alliance of Territorial Communities (GATC), offers a detailed visualization of the current ecological crisis. The generated maps expose the precise location of gas, oil, industrial mining, logging, and massive agribusiness in critical regions such as the Congo, Indonesia, Mesoamerica, and the Amazon, home to approximately 35 million indigenous people.
Juan Carlos Jintiach Arcos, executive secretary of the GATC and member of the Ecuadorian Shuar people, highlighted to SciDev.Net the importance of this comparative evidence. According to the indigenous leader, the data validate historical complaints from their peoples, demonstrating that the threats are not isolated incidents but a structural scheme replicated across all tropical latitudes. Florencia Librizzi, deputy director of Earth Insight, agreed that these visual tools bring to light realities often hidden in dispersed technical databases.
Alarming data by region
The report breaks down the magnitude of the threat by geographical areas. In the Amazon, of the 250 million hectares (Mha) belonging to local communities, the hydrocarbon industry endangers 31 Mha, while mining and logging threaten 9.8 Mha and 2.4 Mha respectively. Although extractivism affects the nine countries of the Amazon basin, there are variations; for example, logging concessions are notably concentrated in Suriname and Guyana.
Meanwhile, Mesoamerica faces particular challenges. There, mining threatens 18.7 Mha of indigenous lands and hydrocarbons 3.7 Mha, mostly in offshore operations. This region also deals with additional pressures from drug trafficking, infrastructure megaprojects, and fragile governance in nations like Nicaragua, Honduras, and Mexico.
Demands for sovereignty and financing for indigenous tropical forests
In light of this scenario, the inhabitants of the affected areas demand substantial changes, focused on the recognition of their rights and the effective application of Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC). Jintiach Arcos emphasized that genuine consent implies sovereignty to decide what enters their territories and should not be manipulated by governments or corporations to obtain quick approvals in indigenous tropical forests.
Levi Sucre Romero, from the Mesoamerican Alliance of Peoples and Forests (AMPB), added the need to reform financing mechanisms. The demand is not just to receive funds, but to adapt the schemes of multilateral organizations and states to strengthen their own territorial governance and create monitoring systems that reflect the local reality.
Perspectives on the future and success stories
External experts like Ivan Brehaut, from the ProPurus Association, value the report for also highlighting the risks to peoples in voluntary isolation (PIACI), refuting the idea that forests are empty spaces. However, he warns that the global economic dependence on fossil fuels remains the main driver of these pressures.
The analysis also sheds light on effective solutions. It shows that the recognition of community governance directly correlates with better conservation. Librizzi cited as an example the Maya Biosphere Reserve in Guatemala, where deforestation in areas managed by communities is seven times lower than the national average.
For leaders like Olo Villalaz of the AMPB, this protection stems from a spiritual and collective vision of “Mother Earth“. Looking to the future, the growing coordination among organizations from the world’s major tropical basins offers a sign of hope for indigenous tropical forests, consolidating a unified voice that, in Jintiach’s words, no longer asks for inclusion but for an alliance on equal terms for global regeneration.
By: Aleida Rueda / SciDev.Net
