Reuters News Service, April 3, 2008
Biofuel plantations, construction of hydropower dams and measures to protect forests, where trees soak up heat-trapping carbon dioxide gas as they grow, can create conflicts with the ancestral lands of indigenous peoples.
"Biofuel production, renewable energy expansion (and) other mitigation measures (are) uprooting indigenous peoples in many regions," the UN University said in a statement on a report released at a conference in
"Indigenous people point to an increase in human rights violations, displacements and conflicts due to expropriation of ancestral lands and forests for biofuel plantations -- soya, sugar cane, jatropha, oil-palm, corn, etc," it said.
It said the world's estimated 370 million indigenous peoples, from the
"Indigenous people have done least to cause climate change and now the solutions ... are causing more problems for them," said Victoria Tauli-Corpuz from the
Tauli-Corpuz, who also represents the Igorot people, told Reuters that 500,000 indigenous people in the
Millions more in
The UN University study said the Ugandan Wildlife Authority had forced people to move from their homes in 2002 when 7,000 hectares (17,300 acres) of land was planted as forests to soak up greenhouse gases.
Zakri said indigenous peoples' lifestyles produced none of the greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels in power plants, factories and cars that are blamed for stoking global warming.
By contrast, the
Indigenous peoples "have not benefited, in any significant manner, from climate change-related funding ... nor from emissions trading schemes," A.H. Zakri, head of the UN University's
The study said indigenous peoples were exploiting traditional knowledge to help offset climate change.
"This is fire abatement that reduces greenhouse gas emissions from wildfires," said Joe Morrison, head of the
The deal involves funding from ConocoPhillips, which runs a plant processing natural gas from the