The Land Back movement is more than a political demand—it is a climate imperative rooted in local and regional ancestral knowledge, relationship, and responsibility. Across Turtle Island, returning land to Indigenous stewardship has shown tangible ecological benefits, helping restore biodiversity, increase climate resilience, and revitalize sacred relationships between peoples and place. Land Back is not solely a political movement—it is fundamentally about and the inherent right to care for the land through Indigenous laws, governance systems, and lifeways rooted in sustainability, reciprocity, and long-term balance.
Why Land Back is a Climate Solution
For generations, Indigenous Nations have safeguarded the natural world by managing ecosystems in accordance with natural law, ensuring the continuity and balance of all life. Today, a growing body of research confirms what many Indigenous Peoples have always known: lands under Indigenous stewardship often outperform state-managed lands in terms of biodiversity, carbon sequestration, and resilience to climate stressors.
A landmark report by the United Nations highlights that Indigenous-managed lands hold as much or more biodiversity than formally protected areas (UNEP-WCMC, 2021). This is not coincidental. Indigenous stewardship is built upon place-based knowledge systems emphasizing interdependence, seasonal cycles, and respect for non-human relatives.
Real-World Examples of Land Back as Ecological Restoration
Across Canada, Indigenous Nations are leading land reclamation and stewardship efforts that serve as powerful models for climate action:
- Syilx Okanagan Nation (British Columbia): Through salmon reintroduction projects in the Columbia River system, the Syilx people have revived an essential species with deep cultural and ecological significance. These efforts are rebuilding food sovereignty, restoring riparian ecosystems, and improving watershed health. The Syilx Nation’s work with the Okanagan Nation Alliance demonstrates how climate action and cultural resurgence go hand-in-hand (Syilx.org).
- Mississaugas of Alderville First Nation (Ontario): The Alderville Black Oak Savannah is one of the best-preserved examples of native grassland ecosystems in Ontario. Using cultural burning and traditional land management techniques, the community has restored a once-fragmented landscape, supporting pollinators, rare plants, and diverse wildlife. These actions have increased carbon storage, soil health, and ecosystem connectivity (Alderville.ca).
- Haida Gwaii (British Columbia): The Haida Nation’s co-governance model with the Government of Canada in the Gwaii Haanas National Park Reserve and Haida Heritage Site demonstrates what respectful partnership and Indigenous leadership can achieve. Through this model, logging was halted, marine protection zones were expanded, and Haida ecological knowledge was embedded in park management strategies.
These are not isolated success stories—they are evidence of what becomes possible when Indigenous Peoples are given the authority and support to govern their territories.
What Land Back Looks Like in Practice
Land Back can take many forms: co-governance agreements, the return of Crown or park lands, support for Indigenous land trusts, and legal recognition of Indigenous land title. In all these models, ecological outcomes improve when Indigenous values and protocols shape land management.
For example:
- Controlled burns restore grassland health.
- Seasonal harvesting prevents overuse.
- Watershed monitoring improves water quality.
- Language and ceremony are woven into stewardship practices that care not just for the land but also for the relational responsibilities associated with it.
These approaches move beyond conservation as enclosure and towards regenerative guardianship.
Recommendations for Readers
- Learn More: Explore the research and advocacy work of Indigenous-led organizations like the Yellowhead Institute.
- Support Indigenous Stewardship: Donate to or volunteer with Indigenous land trusts, guardianship programs, or Nations actively engaged in ecological restoration.
- Advocate for Policy Change: Push for co-governance agreements, the return of protected parklands, and meaningful inclusion of Indigenous Peoples in environmental decision-making.
- Listen and Follow: Center Indigenous leadership, particularly local nations whose territories you reside in. Support their calls to action and respect their governance systems.
Reference Points and Additional Reading
- Yellowhead Institute, Land Back Red Paper: https://yellowheadinstitute.org
- Syilx Okanagan Nation Salmon Restoration: https://www.syilx.org
- Alderville Black Oak Savannah: https://alderville.ca/our-offices-services/alderville-black-oak-savanna/
- UNEP-WCMC, Territories of Life Report, 2021
Blog by Rye Karonhiowanen Barberstock
(Image Credit: Michael Hamments, Unsplash)
The post Land Back Means Climate Action: Connecting Land Reclamation with Ecological Restoration appeared first on Indigenous Climate Hub.
Land Back Means Climate Action: Connecting Land Reclamation with Ecological Restoration
Governments at the COP17 nature summit in Armenia agreed on Saturday to scale up their policies to protect the planet’s shrinking biodiversity, and for the first time invited large emerging economies like China and Gulf states to take on donor responsibilities to help fund those efforts.
For the past two weeks, countries held talks in Yerevan under the UN Convention on Biological Diversity to outline a plan to ramp up currently “insufficient” policies to conserve land and marine ecosystems. A recent UN progress report found the world is off track to meet 22 out of 23 global targets aimed at reversing species loss and protecting 30% of land and seas by 2030.
While a response plan, called the “Global Review of Collective Progress”, was expected to be the main outcome of COP17, negotiations struggled to advance amid a deadlock over the controversial subject of how to finance the boost in conservation measures needed.
After an all-night session on Friday, delegates agreed to invite developing countries to voluntarily signal their interest in assuming donor funding obligations alongside developed nations. Negotiators repeatedly warned that any stronger provisions on expanding the donor base would collapse the deal.
COP president: Results beat expectations
An exhausted COP17 president Hambardzum Matevosyan, Armenia’s environment minister, told journalists in the early hours of Saturday that “we’ve achieved more than we could’ve expected” given the “importance” of the decisions being taken.
“It was 100% possible that those items did not made it through. 100% possible,” he said, adding that the conference had made progress on “all the most important items”.
Speaking at the closing plenary, the group of Pacific Islands said that, while the summit had achieved “great outcomes”, delegates are also departing Yerevan “with realities not reflected in the official text”, such as the low replenishment of the Global Environment Facility (GEF), a key funder of nature projects.
-
Lula’s election win in Brazil raises hopes for zero deforestation drive
Lula’s re-election makes it more likely Brazil can meet a key goal to end forest loss in the Amazon and builds confidence in a new fund to protect the world’s rainforests, experts say
Some observers also said the deal did not go far enough. Steven Guilbeault, a former Canadian environment minister who helped broker the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), said the Yerevan package of action is “an important step forward”, but still “falls short of what is needed to meet our 2030 commitments”.
An Lambrechts, biodiversity politics expert at Greenpeace International, said COP17 had kept things moving forward and set well-intentioned promises, but added that these “won’t remove major roadblocks to implementation” such as insufficient finance and debt constraints in developing countries.
WWF chief conservation officer Daudi Sumba noted that financial issues were not fully resolved. Despite the deal in Yerevan, “I fear finance will remain the key issue that continues to haunt the UN biodiversity summits,” he said in a statement.
‘Yerevan Pathway’ tackles nature plans and subsidies
In the lead-up to the summit, the UN assessment report showed countries are falling short on virtually all targets in the GBF, the 2022 global deal often referred to as the ‘Paris Agreement for nature’.
They include a landmark target to protect at least 30% of the planet’s land and sea by 2030. If countries all stick to their current national goals, about 26% of land would be protected and only about 12% of marine ecosystems would be under conservation measures.
The main COP17 decision – named the Yerevan Pathway by the presidency – calls for countries to revise their biodiversity plans, subject to available funding, with a particular focus on addressing the gap in coverage of “marine, coastal and inland water ecosystems”.
It also urges the over 60 countries who have not submitted a biodiversity plan yet to finalise them “as soon as possible” and taking into account the gaps identified by the UN progress report.
Countries also agreed to tackle the drivers of biodiversity loss by “accelerating” the reduction of subsidies for activities that damage nature. Subsidy reform, covered by Target 18 of the GBF, is where countries have made the least progress so far, according to the assessment report.
Jill Hepp, director of nature and marine policy and incentives at green group Conservation International, said singling out subsidies in the Yerevan Pathway “gives a strong signal” that closing the gap for biodiversity action requires “more urgent efforts to reform harmful incentives and scale up positive incentives”.
“Timid” steps to expand base of donors
Having failed to meet a target to channel $20 billion for biodiversity conservation by 2025 and faced with shrinking aid budgets, the EU pushed a proposal to expand the list of which countries count as donors, so that wealthy emerging economies like China and Saudi Arabia could also voluntarily contribute. The group of Arab nations strongly opposed this.
During the talks, Irish minister of state for nature, Christopher O’Sullivan, whose country holds the EU presidency, said the bloc wanted the world’s “new realities” to be reflected in the donor list.
Negotiations remained gridlocked for most of the two-week talks, until a last-day compromise was struck to invite developing countries that may want donor status “to indicate to the [Convention on Biological Diversity] secretariat their interest in being included in the corresponding list”.
Countries also asked the secretariat to send an invitation to emerging economies wanting donor status at each subsequent COP, and requested a technical report on “the implications of inclusion in the list” for emerging economies.
Swiss lead negotiator Gabriela Blatter said during one of the sessions that her country had expected greater steps towards expanding the base of contributing countries, but added that “if we’re mutually unhappy, it’s probably the closest we can get on these very delicate political compromises”. Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, also noted their dissatisfaction but said it had expected “a lot less”.
The fragile deal was approved in a package of decisions together with the Global Review, after some delegations including Brazil and China appealed to the plenary not to make further changes to the text at the risk of collapsing the whole agreement.
In a statement delivered to the closing plenary, the EU said the finance outcome had delivered “timid” progress towards fully broadening the base of donors.
Cali Fund still not operational
Adopted two years ago at COP16, the Cali Fund was seen by some observers as a way to channel private-sector finance into biodiversity conservation, as governments struggle to find public funds. But it is still struggling to get up on its feet.
The fund allows big corporations to access certificates for the use of genetic material found in biodiversity in return for a financial contribution, which experts estimate has the potential to raise up to $6.9bn for biodiversity. While voluntary, companies are encouraged to pay 1% of their profits or 0.1% of revenue into the fund.
But since its creation, the fund has received little more than $10,000, which Guilbeault argued is because the rules for disbursements to local communities and the operation of the fund had yet to be fleshed out. This was due to happen at COP17.
Yet, while the final decision on the fund laid out some of the rules – including how companies can earn “Cali Fund certificates” – some key technical details were left to the next COP in 2028 in Ecuador. This includes the issue of whether companies can pay a lower rate if they use genetic data for only a small portion of their products.
“By punting essential decisions to two years from now, parties have all but ensured the fund remains empty until then,” said Pakhi Das, a public policy advisor at NGO Plant-for-the-Planet.
The post COP17 delivers fragile deal to boost conservation and funding for nature appeared first on Climate Home News.
COP17 delivers fragile deal to boost conservation and funding for nature
SYDNEY, Thursday 30 October 2026 — In response to reports that the Albanese government is set to introduce draft legislation this year that would seek to ban data centres in Australia’s suburbs, Joe Rafalowicz, Head of Climate and Energy at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said:
“These reports are a testament to the growing community opposition to these completely inappropriate AI factories that have sprung up across our suburbs, and Big Tech corporations should take heed — the data centre build-out must not happen without the endorsement of the Australian people.
“But the government can’t simply ship this problem out to regional Australia without addressing the fundamental issues with this extractive new industry.
“We’re already seeing a trend of AI data centre proposals moving to the regions, in areas that are more water-scarce, more environmentally sensitive, and next to sources of fracked and coal seam gas to support their massive BYO gas-fired power plans — a pattern we’ve seen play out in the United States.
“From the Beetaloo Basin in the NT to the Western Downs in Qld, we’re seeing a wave of AI data centre proposals that would see new gas fast-tracked to support their massive energy demand, and threaten to completely derail Australia’s energy transition.
“Just as suburban Australians are asking, “what for?”, regional communities like Berry Springs and Dalby do not want dirty data centres setting up shop with absolutely no benefit to their communities. Greenpeace is calling for a moratorium on AI data centre developments until strict and enforceable safeguards are in place to protect our climate and our communities.”
-ENDS-
Media contact
Kate O’Callaghan on +61 406 231 892 or kate.ocallaghan@greenpeace.org
AI data centre ban in suburbs would not address fundamental issues: Greenpeace
In the thick of the COP29 climate summit in Azerbaijan in 2024, the UN climate talks were rattled by what can only be described as a major PR disaster. The BBC, Reuters and The Guardian all carried headlines, attributed to leading climate policy experts, that the COPs were “no longer fit for purpose”.
The articles outlined a series of reforms called for in an open letter signed by 22 eminent scientists and politicians, including a former UN secretary-general and previous UN climate chief, with a further 150 lending their support. The headlines shook confidence in the COP process, just as governments were wrestling over a new climate finance goal.
The Club of Rome – which handled the media relations for the letter – hurried to say that its “constructive, supportive ideas” had been “misinterpreted”. Negotiators kept calm(ish) and carried on, in the end landing the finance goal after some high-stakes drama on the final day.
-
Early speakers’ list suggests few powerful leaders will attend COP31
Just 77 heads of state or government are scheduled to address the COP31 climate summit in Antalya, a third less than the COP28 peak -
Africa wants adaptation finance on COP31 agenda, raising risk of a fight
The African Group wants dedicated space on tripling adaptation finance, the Green Climate Fund and trade, setting up a possible clash
To my surprise, when I went back this week to read the letter again, I could not find the offending line about the COPs not being fit for purpose. The Club of Rome has yet to respond to my query about its disappearance.
Whatever happened to the wording, that sentiment has been widely shared. COPs have ballooned in size while the importance of their outcomes seems to have diminished since the 2015 Paris Agreement (with the exception of the 2023 COP in Dubai where countries agreed to transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems).
The same on the surface
Two years on from those painful headlines in Baku, has anything changed for the better? You might be forgiven for thinking not. Official decisions are still made by consensus rather than the majority voting some have called for to stop blockers.
Tens of thousands of officials, activists and business execs still scurry around the halls to an ever-growing list of side events, roundtables and dialogues, while deals still come down to rows, all-nighters and jargon-filled texts adopted to rounds of applause.
But it would not be true to say that COPs have completely failed to respond to the very real need to translate the words of the Paris Agreement into action in the outside world.
Global warming is projected to be around 1.3C lower this century than it would have been if the world had not committed to tackle the climate crisis under that accord. Developing countries have a valued space at COPs in which their voices have equal weight in decision-making, unlike in many other international for