Climate change on the front line

Lesson 3 of 5 in "Peoples today", about 6 minutes

Climate change is the long-term warming of the planet caused mainly by burning coal, oil and gas. Its effects fall unevenly. Peoples who live directly from the land and sea, in the Arctic, on small islands, in dry lands and in high mountains, notice small shifts quickly and have the least cushion against them. Most have contributed almost nothing to the emissions that cause the problem.

The Arctic

The Arctic is warming several times faster than the global average. Sea ice is thinner and lasts for less of the year, making travel and hunting more dangerous. Permafrost, the permanently frozen ground, is thawing, so that buildings tilt and coastlines crumble. Sámi and Nenets herders report winter rain that freezes into a crust of ice over the pasture, so that reindeer cannot reach the lichen beneath.

Islands and coasts

Low coral islands in the Pacific stand only a few metres above the sea. Rising water erodes the shore, floods gardens with salt and spoils wells. Torres Strait Islanders, between Australia and New Guinea, face the same threat. In 2022 the United Nations Human Rights Committee found that Australia had failed to protect a group of Torres Strait Islanders from the effects of climate change, in breach of their rights to culture and to family life.

Dry lands, mountains and forests

• In the Sahel and East Africa, herders such as the Fulani, Turkana and Maasai face more frequent and severe droughts, which kill livestock and sharpen disputes over water.
• In the Andes, glaciers that feed streams used by Quechua and Aymara farmers are shrinking.
• In the Himalaya, herders and farmers report less reliable snow and changing seasons.
• In the Amazon, longer dry seasons and fires damage forests that are home to hundreds of peoples.
• In India, tribal farmers who depend on rain-fed fields are exposed to erratic monsoons.

When knowledge stops matching the weather

A less visible loss is the reliability of traditional knowledge. Calendars built on generations of observation, such as when birds arrive, when a tree flowers or when the ice is safe, no longer match what happens. Elders in many regions say they can no longer predict the weather as they once could. That weakens both safety and the standing of the knowledge itself.

Harm from the cure

Some answers to climate change create new problems. Large dams, wind farms, biofuel plantations and mines for battery metals are often placed on indigenous land. In 2021 Norway's Supreme Court ruled that wind turbines built on the Fosen peninsula violated the rights of Sámi reindeer herders, because they disrupted winter grazing. Forest carbon schemes have in some cases restricted communities' use of their own forests.

Part of the solution

Indigenous peoples are also among the most effective actors. Forests under secure indigenous tenure store large amounts of carbon and are generally cut down less than neighbouring land. Aboriginal ranger groups in northern Australia use customary early-season burning to prevent the large late fires that release more greenhouse gases. Farmers keep hardy crop varieties, such as millets and native potatoes, that cope with drought and frost.

The world's climate scientists now recognise this. Reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change state that indigenous knowledge is valuable for adaptation and that supporting indigenous self-determination helps. At the United Nations climate talks, a dedicated platform for local communities and indigenous peoples has operated since the Paris Agreement of 2015.

What communities ask for

The requests are consistent across regions. Secure rights to land, since people cannot protect what they do not control. A seat where decisions are made. Direct access to climate funds, very little of which reaches indigenous organisations at present. And respect for consent when projects are proposed on their territories. These are the same rights set out in earlier lessons, applied to a new and urgent problem.