{"id":50677,"date":"2024-04-17T17:44:52","date_gmt":"2024-04-17T16:44:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/?p=50677"},"modified":"2024-04-18T09:23:35","modified_gmt":"2024-04-18T08:23:35","slug":"as-donors-dither-indigenous-funds-seek-to-decolonise-green-finance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2024\/04\/17\/as-donors-dither-indigenous-funds-seek-to-decolonise-green-finance\/","title":{"rendered":"As donors dither, Indigenous funds seek to decolonise green finance\u00a0\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

For over a decade, Indigenous and local communities have demanded a bigger share of international funding to protect nature and the climate, as well as easier access to that money. But progress has been limited, with only 1-2 percent of such finance reaching them directly, reports show.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Now frustrated Indigenous rights groups are trying a new tactic to speed up change: creating their own funds in a push to boost the flow of money to frontline communities and shift away from what some see as an outdated colonial-style model driven by donors in the Global North.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Since 2020 – and especially last year – more than half a dozen new Indigenous-led funds have sprung up, largely in forest-rich Brazil but also in developing countries from Indonesia to Mexico.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Many are still in a start-up phase, but a few have already begun pushing money to frontline communities. They include the Mesoamerican Territorial Fund (MTF), which invested $1.3 million in 32 projects – from chocolate production to tourism and protecting traditional knowledge – in communities from Mexico to Panama last year.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe are aiming not only to make the funds reach the real guardians of the forest and the real guardians of mitigating and adapting to climate change, but also to support sustainability, democracy and good governance of all these territories,\u201d said Mar\u00eda P\u00eda Hern<\/span>\u00e1<\/span>ndez, a lawyer and regional manager for the MTF.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

World Bank climate funding<\/strong> greens African hotels while fishermen sink<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Multilateral funds can take years to approve projects and often struggle to funnel big pots of nature and climate finance into the smaller-scale projects communities need, Indigenous leaders said.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The new funds aim to fill the gap by gathering large amounts of money, distributing it nimbly and leap-frogging the barriers faced by forest communities in dealing with traditional funds, such as onerous paperwork.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe aim to improve not just the condition of the territories and people who live there but also promote global climatic justice,” <\/span>Hern<\/span>\u00e1<\/span>ndez said on the sidelines of last week\u2019s Skoll World Forum<\/a>, a gathering of social innovators. <\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Bypassing the giants<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

As the World Bank and International Monetary Fund hold their Spring Meetings<\/a> in Washington this week, focused in part on reshaping lending for climate action, Indigenous communities are already rethinking how to better access the resources they need to protect nature and the climate – and to ensure those on the frontline benefit from changes such as new clean energy infrastructure.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Along the way, they are setting up new rules and structures in line with their own traditions and beliefs, after years of chafing against constraints imposed by big donors, some of them former colonial powers.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Fossil fuel debts<\/strong> are illegitimate and must be cancelled<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In Canada, for instance, many Indigenous governing bodies now run their own renewable energy utilities, providing a fifth of Canada\u2019s renewables, said Joan Carling, executive director of Indigenous Peoples Rights International.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIf we transform the business-as-usual and create the enabling environment and conditions to put Indigenous people at the centre of this, then we can have a truly just, equitable renewable energy for all,\u201d she said.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

A new dashboard<\/a> released last week by the Rights and Resources Initiative and the Rainforest Foundation Norway shows climate finance for indigenous and local communities rose between 2020 and 2023 to about $517 million per year, a 36 percent increase over the previous four years.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n