Climate Solutions from the Amazon Are Presented at Bonn

Juan Carlos Jintiach, Ruth Buendía y Estebancio Castro. Foto: Rafael Ponte / Servindi

Indigenous representatives of COICA and AIDESEP presented action solutions to the deforestation and degradation impacts on the Amazon forests. The meeting took place during the Climate Change Conference in Bonn.

Servindi, May 7, 2018.- "We present the solutions from the Amazon (to climate change)" was the opening line of the press conference that the Coordinator of the Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon Basin (COICA, in Spanish) gave during the Climate Change Conference in Bonn.

The great event has been held since April 30 and will end on May 10. It should be noted that the sessions that take place in this event will direct the decisions taken at the next Conference of the Parties (COP) in December.

Juan Carlos Jintiach, technical advisor of COICA, Ruth Buendia Mestoquiari, representative of the Interethnic Association of Development of the Peruvian Jungle (AIDESEP) and Estebancio Castro, legal advisor of COICA participated in the media event.

The indigenous representatives presented solutions to the climate change impacts. One of them was the REDD + Indigenous Amazonian, or RIA, proposal which was presented through the following summary video.

Ruth Buendía, leader of the Ashaninka people and national representative of AIDESEP, pointed out the importance of recognizing the right of indigenous peoples to the territory, for women in particular.

"Without territory there is no life and there is no knowledge," she said, referring to the negotiations that are taking place at the Bonn Conference on the implementation of the Local Communities and Indigenous Peoples Platform.

In turn, Juan Carlos Jintiach, technical advisor of COICA, indicated that the titling of indigenous communities is important to stop the engines of deforestation.

He pointed out that COICA and its affiliated organizations have been identifying priority zones for titling, demarcation, and clearence, among other processes accompanied by strategies to recover ancestral territories.

In addition, Jintiach presented a map that shows the forest density of the indigenous territories in the Amazon basin and the pressures of deforestation, to be used as a tool to monitor and mitigate the impacts of degradation and deforestation.

The event ended with an invitation to those present to participate in the IV Amazon Summit, the II Congress of Women and the Congress of the COICA, which will be held from June 18 to 22, 2018, in Macapá, Brazil.

You can see the press conference here (from minute 06:30 approx.).