Indigenous Peoples’ lands are threatened by industrial development: conversion risk assessment...
Indigenous Peoples are critical to the success of global conservation. However, their stewardship is challenged by the expansion of industrial development. This paper presents a spatial analysis of IP territories and land conversion pressure.
Study link: One Earth, Cell Press (2023)
Indigenous Peoples are custodians of many of the world’s least-exploited natural areas. These places of local and global socio-ecological importance face significant threats from industrial development expansion, but the risk of conversion of these lands remains unclear. This study combines global datasets of Indigenous Peoples’ lands, their current ecological condition, and future industrial development pressure to assess conversion threats. To assess vulnerability and risk of conversion, an index is developed based on indicators of the strength and security of Indigenous Peoples’ rights to their territories and resources, their representation and engagement in decisions impacting them, and the capital available to support conservation and sustainable development.
The study finds that nearly 60% of Indigenous Peoples’ lands (22.7 million km2) are threatened in 64 countries. Among the 37 countries with the highest threat, socio-economic and political vulnerabilities increase conversion risk, particularly the limited recognition and protection of territorial rights. A composite RRC index is developed that integrates 6 existing indexes, representing the socio-economic and political contexts that support Indigenous governance and stewardship:
- legal security of IndigenousPeoples’ lands index (ILS)
- political stability index (POL)
- control of corruption index (COR)
- environmental democracy index (EDI)
- human development index (HDI)
- sustainable development goal investments (SDGs)
The inverse of the RRC is used as a proxy for the vulnerability of Indigenous Peoples’ lands to conversion from industrial development.
Lead researcher: Christina Kennedy, The Nature Conservancy (TNC)
Contributing authors: Brandie Fariss (TNC), James Oakleaf (TNC), Stephen Garnett (Darwin U), Álvaro Fernández-Llamazares (U Helsinki), Julia Fa (Manchester Metropolitan U), Sharon Baruch-Mordo (TRAFFIC), Joseph Kiesecker (TNC)