INDIGENOUS FORESTS ARE SOME OF THE AMAZON’S LAST CARBON SINKS

FForests around the world play a major role in curbing or contributing to climate change. Standing, healthy forests sequester more atmospheric carbon than they emit and act as a carbon sink; degraded and deforested areas release stored carbon and are a carbon source. orests are a net carbon sink globally, but there’s huge variation locally. Our analysis finds that forests managed by Indigenous people in the Amazon were strong net carbon sinks from 2001-2021, collectively removing a net 340 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere each year, equivalent to the U.K.’s annual fossil fuel emissions.Meanwhile, forests outside of the Amazon’s Indigenous lands were collectively a carbon source, due to significant forest loss. The research underscores the need to help Indigenous people and other local communities safeguard their forest homes and preserve some of the Amazon’s remaining carbon sinks.

Indigenous Peoples Are Strong Forest Protectors

For Indigenous people and other communities, their land is a primary source of food, medicine, fuelwood and construction materials, as well as employment, income, welfare, security, culture and spirituality. Community land is also a basis for social identity, status and political relations. A growing body of research shows that lands managed by Indigenous people — both through legal title and informal, customary ownership — have lower deforestation rates than similar lands managed by other forest users. Lands legally held or titled to Indigenous people exhibit even lower deforestation rates than untitled Indigenous lands, underscoring the importance of tenure security to sustainable land management. Moreover, research shows that lands held by Indigenous people and other communities — much of which is forested — are rich stores of carbon, and a significant share is held only under customary tenure arrangements, where land is not legally recognized as belonging to the communities or titled to them by the government. The extent to which these forests are carbon sinks or sources, however, has not been explored in depth until now. Here’s what our analysis shows:

CARBON FLUX: HOW FORESTS SERVE AS CARBON SINKS — OR CARBON SOURCES

The world’s forests, which cover about 30% of Earth’s land, absorbed approximately 7.2 billion more tonnes of CO2 per year than they emitted between 2001 and 2021, about twice as much carbon as they released. Deforestation, degradation and other disturbances, however, have already turned some of the world’s most iconic forests into carbon sources and threaten to convert others. The Amazon, the world’s largest tropical forest, remains a net carbon sink, but it teeters on the edge of becoming a net source. Southeastern Amazonia already emits more carbon than it sequesters. Over the past 40-50 years, an estimated 17% of Amazonian forest has been lost, of which over four-fifths was converted to agricultural land, mainly pastures. Scientists estimate that deforesting 20% of the Amazon could push it past a tipping point, triggering a large-scale dieback that would release more than 90 billion tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere (approximately 2.5 times greater than annual global fossil fuel emissions), transform the forest into a savannah and disrupt rainfall across South America.

About 1.5 million Indigenous people from 385 different ethnic groups reside in the Amazon bioregion, which includes portions of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Peru, Suriname and Venezuela.3 Indigenous people hold about 29% of the bioregion, of which almost half is in Brazil. Given that forests make up more than 80% of the bioregion, these collectively managed lands —henceforth referred to as “Indigenous forests” — are vital for halting forest loss. Our analysis of carbon emissions and removals finds that Indigenous forests in all nine Amazonian countries were net carbon sinks between 2001 and 2021, collectively emitting an average of 120 million tonnes of CO2e per year and removing 460 million tonnes CO2/year, making them a net sink of 340 million tonnes of CO2e/year.4 However, the relative magnitudes of emissions and removals — known as carbon fluxes — varied greatly between countries.

The relative magnitudes of removals and emissions can be considered an indicator of how “secure” a carbon sink is. A higher ratio means that emissions must increase more, or removals must decrease more, to turn the area into a net carbon source. For example, Indigenous forests in Bolivia and Peru had higher emissions relative to removals — and thus were closer to turning into carbon sources — than Indigenous forests in Brazil, which removed about 4 times more carbon than they emitted. Indigenous forests are net carbon sinks in all 9 Amazonian countries (2001-2021)