March Issue
Loowit Morrison
March
What comes to mind when you think of “combating climate change?” Perhaps it is global initiatives like the Paris Climate Agreement or technological developments like 3-D coral reefs. Climate dialogue today typically centers on these Western initiatives and innovations, thus omitting a key well of expertise: Indigenous knowledge.
In the United States, guidance for Federal Departments and Agencies on Indigenous Knowledge describes the concept as a “body of observations, oral and written knowledge, innovations, practices, and beliefs developed by Tribes and Indigenous Peoples through interaction and experience with the environment.” Developed across millennia and passed down through generations, Indigenous knowledge carries “ancient and intergenerational wisdom that is flexible, fluid, and adaptive.”
Many Indigenous cultures worldwide are rooted in deep understanding and respect for the environment and thus were some of the first communities to notice early signs of climate change. Although they “contribute the least to greenhouse emissions,” Indigenous peoples acutely feel the effects of climate change, which exacerbates political and economic marginalization, loss of land, human rights violations and unemployment.
In many cases, unstable environmental conditions become so extreme that Indigenous communities are forced to resettle or migrate. Confronted with rising temperatures, increasing wildfires and decreases in soil moisture, many communities in Central and South America and the Caribbean have relocated to environments that, while not their ancestral lands, permit them to continue their traditional ways of life. Others who cannot resettle must immigrate to other areas, often to slums. As both Indigenous and migrants, these individuals face “double discrimination,” exposed to heightened threats of trafficking and smuggling.
To understand why Indigenous peoples are particularly affected by climate change, it is important to take a step back and analyze climate change as not exclusively an environmental problem, but also a colonial one. Today, Western powers have asserted a hegemony over environmental dialogues, pushing a certain set of values to the forefront and dismissing Indigenous knowledge. These Western lexicons treat ecosystems wholly as resources to be controlled and profited from, a perspective that has led to an endless demand for more natural resources through systems of monocropping and market-oriented production. Many of these resources are extracted from Indigenous lands, which has created an interconnection between climate change, land dispossession and discrimination against Indigenous peoples.
Despite being excluded from many climate-oriented conversations, Indigenous knowledge has, time and time again, displayed the potential to develop relevant solutions to climate issues. Research from the Royal Society of Canada’s Academy of Science has shown that many ecosystems managed by Indigenous peoples are in better health than others, thanks to factors such as higher carbon density forests and wetlands. A report published in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment explains that at least 36% of intact forest landscapes are located on Indigenous peoples’ lands, in which the deterioration rates are considerably lower than on other lands.
So, how do Indigenous communities implement their knowledge in the face of climate change? Indigenous knowledge is not uniform across communities and manifests in a variety of different regional practices around the world.
In Australia, Indigenous communities practice fire management via “cool burning,” a practice that uses controlled low-intensity fires to reduce fuel loads, manage vegetation and promote biodiversity. Used for over 6,000 years, cool burning protects wildlife while generating less heat than standard hazard-reduction burning, thus retaining tree canopies and preventing wildfires.
Many Indigenous Maya communities in Central America and Southern Mexico employ milpa systems, a sustainable farming model that involves rotating agricultural plots to allow for natural forest regeneration. Forming “forest gardens” with high biodiversity and soil fertility, milpa produces more volumes of food per area in a practice more sustainable than monocropping, according to the National Institute of Health.
Indigenous communities in Guatemala’s Dry Corridor, a region acutely affected by cycles of drought and intense rain, frequently rely on K’uxu’rum agroforestry. K’uxu’rum combines corn and bean cultivation with that of madre cacao trees, interspersing rows of trees with crops. This system allows tree roots to extract nutrients and fix atmospheric nitrogen, which in turn aids crop cultivation, fashioning corn and beans as less prone to droughts.
Clearly, Indigenous traditions and expertise pose an opportunity to tackle climate change with sustainable, already-existing practices. How, then, can it be implemented into a climate dialogue so heavily dominated by Western opinions? Blackfoot Knowledge Keeper and scholar Leroy Little Bear advocates an advancement past the either-or mentality of Western thought. Combating climate change, he argues, requires a “marriage of [Western science and native science].”
One case study that managed to combine traditional and modern insight was in response to Afghanistan’s devastating 2022 and 2023 earthquakes. In the wake of disasters, there is often heightened emphasis on the implementation of cutting-edge technologies, often leading to solutions that are inappropriate for the people they serve. Instead of shining a hasty spotlight on modern technology, reactions to Afghanistan’s earthquakes analyzed traditional Afghan architecture, with an emphasis on minimal water usage, strength in the face of severe weather fluctuations and resource management. Combining traditional architectural knowledge with modern technology allowed for an effective rebuilding effort in Afghanistan. While not directly linked to climate change, Afghanistan highlights the merit in synthesizing Indigenous knowledge with more modernized technology to respond to critical disasters.
Moreover, combating climate change is not merely a technological change. Rather, it requires a fundamental social change. Indigenous knowledge is proven to hold vast potential for environmental progress, but Indigenous peoples are often overlooked as agents of change. Benefitting from Indigenous practices thus requires a procedural refocus on how we react to climate change.
Above all, this change in perspective must emphasize the self-determination of Indigenous peoples. Structural remnants of colonialism hinder the capacity for Indigenous self-determination, engendering political underrepresentation on both national and international scales. Moreover, Indigenous peoples are also more likely to encounter obstacles such as poor infrastructure, lack of internet and insufficient funds to combat climate change. However, various efforts worldwide aim to uplift Indigenous voices in the fight against climate change.
Such efforts in climate dialogue have been embodied through a range of programs. Internationally, the United Nations Development Programme and Global Environment Facility’s Small Grants Programme has invested approximately $163 million to implement over 5,800 various projects across a range of focuses, including biodiversity conservation, land degradation and chemicals and waste management. On a national level, Bolivia’s Uru Uru team has built upon Indigenous knowledge of native plants to develop innovative floating rafts and reduce pollution. Overall, policies regarding the implementation of these climate-conscious practices must center on the improvement of Indigenous peoples’ status and capacities to be change-makers.
Inuk author and advocate Siila Watt-Cloutier emphasizes the universality of Indigenous knowledge, unbound by geographical or cultural lines. “[T]raditional knowledge is not just for Indigenous people, it’s for everybody”, he states, emphasizing that its power is not limited to Indigenous communities. If the rest of the world were to recognize its capacity for change, the narrative surrounding climate change could be rebuilt in more effective and sustainable ways.
Deb Haaland, the first Indigenous cabinet secretary in the U.S., once stated that “everything depends on our ability to sustainably inhabit this earth, and true sustainability will require us all to change our way of thinking on how we take from the earth and how we give back.” Haaland’s statement reminds us that the fight against climate change is happening now. Our current methods to counter climate change are not suitable—saving our planet requires a fundamental reevaluation of how we define the fight against climate change, and soon.
Photo source: Amy Ponce on Flickr