For centuries, indigenous communities have successfully thrived in the Amazon regions, and with respectful collaboration using the forests and river resources. In the last decade, however, threats against these communities have increased throughout the Amazon basin. Illegal logging, illegal mining, and drug trafficking have led to the murder of 33 indigenous people defending their territories and common resources. Because of ineffective governmental support, these defenders, their organizations and communities have proposed communitarian and traditional strategies as well as innovative measures to protect the Amazonian “commons”. In this session we will share the experiences of these indigenous defenders as they try to protect their common territories, and will present feasible and realistic options for their survival.
Using conventional economic and statistical techniques the author will develop ranges of economic losses in the Amazon basin. Alvarez will be building on information developed by other authors, the Superintendency of Banks and Insurance of Peru and her own studies of the 1980s to early 2000s on illicit drugs in Peru. The idea is to show the dramatic losses in the Amazon rainforest caused by the various illicit activities which are allowed to gradually destroy those areas.
Emerging resource sustainability challenges increasingly impact Indigenous communities in Amazonia. Despite significant progress in securing land rights and the critical role Indigenous territories play in preserving forest cover, issues such as wildlife depletion, forest impoverishment, and land scarcity have been documented in specific settlements. The prospect of land scarcity is particularly concerning, as research suggests it may lead to problematic land system transitions, jeopardizing traditional Indigenous land management practices that have sustained anthropic forest landscapes in the Amazon. This paper examines factors and processes associated with rising land scarcity among Indigenous territories in the Peruvian Amazon. Results reveal the critical role of territorial enclosure in producing land scarcity, framing it as an issue of Indigenous land rights rather than land management. This study contributes to our understanding of resource sustainability challenges faced by Amazonian Indigenous communities and highlights the importance of addressing land rights to maintain effective forest conservation practices.
This paper examines the intersection of climate justice and criminal governance through the experiences of indigenous communities defending their commons in the extractive frontier of the Peruvian Amazon. Drawing on interviews with indigenous leaders from various regions, the study explores how conservation efforts are influenced by both state policies and Illicit activities pressures, such as land trafficking, logging, mining and the drug trade. These threats complicate the communities' efforts to protect their territories, revealing the political dimensions of climate justice. Indigenous communities are forced to navigate the tension between imposed conservation measures, limited resources or unequal distribution of climate change funds, and the need to secure their livelihoods. Moreover, illicit extractive economies—while generating revenue—bring violence and environmental degradation, further eroding the territorial autonomy of indigenous peoples.
This paper positions these findings within broader theoretical frameworks of climate justice, highlighting how conservation pressures linked to climate change governance, alongside the challenges and opportunities of illicit extractive activities, place indigenous common defenders in an increasingly vulnerable situation. The paper argues that indigenous defense of the commons is not only about ecological preservation but also about resisting external forces that threaten both the environment and political sovereignty, ultimately jeopardizing the preservation of their way of life.
The threats to the communities that inhabit the Amazon forests are increasing, especially illegal mining, drug trafficking and organized crime have expanded into protected areas and even into indigenous community lands. Faced with this, these communities have designed and implemented autonomous mechanisms to protect their communal lands, however, have had to include broader coordination mechanisms, involving a group of communities from each river basin. This internal reflection and need for more effective protection implied an important element for the construction of indigenous territories, which would be a way of building their collective memory with the forests, but also to preserve their world, their culture and their forests. The paper presents this transition from building communal mechanisms to a much broader and more comprehensive one for indigenous territory.
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