REDD-plus, forest people’s rights and nested climate governance

A forthcoming editorial in the journal Global Environmental Change
discusses three broad principles for protecting the rights of indigenous
peoples and members of local communities under REDD-plus actions.

Thomas Sikor, Johannes Stahl, Thomas Enters, Jesse C. Ribot, Neera Singh,
William D. Sunderlin, and Lini Wollenberg show how climate change
negotiators can operationalize the "rights of indigenous peoples and
members of local communities" acknowledged by the Ad Hoc Working Group on
Long-term Cooperative Action at the last UNFCCC Conference in Copenhagen.
Pointing to recent experience with the recognition of forest people's
rights, they suggest the need for forest people's participation in
political decision making, equitable distribution of forest benefits, and
recognition of their particular identities, histories and experiences.

Only if the future climate agreement recognizes all three principles will
forestry overcome forest people's historical dispossession, political
exclusion and cultural marginalization. In addition, they emphasize that
global-scale institutions will be important but not sufficient in
themselves for the recognition of forest people's rights. Effective and
equitable REDD-plus requires nested forest and climate governance,
including decision-making processes at multiple scales and related across
scales.

http://www.uea.ac.uk/dev/faculty/Sikor/REDD-plus_editorial

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