At COP26, a new global coalition, the Peoples Forest Partnership, announced plans to mobilize US $20 billion in funding per year by 2030 directly to Indigenous community-driven forest conservation and restoration projects. The coalition aims to ‘set a high standard for equitable, accessible, and culturally appropriate mechanisms for forest communities to engage with climate finance.’
So what?
Indigenous people manage large portions of the world’s biodiversity while receiving very little in international climate assistance. Often, funding directed towards Indigenous communities doesn’t actually reach them, as much of it gets captured by intermediary agencies. Thus, this new coalition will have to find measures to make the finance accessible to frontline communities and minimize its loss across intermediary bodies.
Projects that develop the capacity of communities and of front-line organisations to better access the available finance might be essential in ensuring minimal loss of finance along intermediary bodies. Capacity-building would also allow the communities to have greater control over the direction of the projects.
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