climate change

Indigenous peoples’ resilience is rooted in traditional knowledge and their deep understanding of the land.

For indigenous peoples, resilience is rooted in traditional knowledge, as their capacity to adapt to environmental change is based first and foremost on in-depth understanding of the land.

As climate change increasingly impacts indigenous landscapes, communities are responding and adapting in unique ways.

United Nations University (2012)

 Program: Qaujisaut (To See, To Find Out): This program was mainly directed toward Inuit youth, facing hard choices - caught between two cultures. It is entertaining, fast and fun. Up and coming young musical talent was promoted on Qaujisaut. Qaujisaut taught young people important life skills as well as touching on timely health issues and covering stories important to youth.… Uqalimakkanirit

Students in Arviat learn to conduct a fish necropsy with Vincent L'Herault. Filmed and produced by the Arviat Wellness Media Team.

Program name: Qaggiq
Qaggiq (Gathering Place) was a current affairs program (refers to a large igloo built for the gathering of several families).
Producer: Iqaluit - Inuit Broadcasting Corporation
Host: Jobie Uitaaluktuq (Weetaluktuk)
Camera: Mark Gordon

Location: Iqaluit
Segment 1: News with Elisapee Davidee.

A look at the construction of community grow houses to support local food production in Arviat, Nunavut during summer 2013. Produced by Curtis Konek and Patrick Pingushat from the Arviat Youth Media Research Team with funding from Health Canada.

By Nanisiniq History Project, Jordan Konek, Arviat, NU

Can REDD forests ever become green? Social and other safeguards are needed if REDD initiatives are to cut GHG emissions while doing no harm and benefiting indigenous peoples.

Deforestation, especially of tropical forests, makes up 18 percent of annual global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions — more emissions than the entire global transportation sector.

REDD initiatives aim to reduce GHG emissions by assigning forests a monetary value based on their capacity to absorb and store atmospheric carbon. REDD+ initiatives attempt to incorporate additional sources of forest value, such as ecosystem services, biodiversity conservation, and local livelihoods.

Both REDD and REDD+ approaches feed into carbon markets that are supposed to generate significant financial flows from companies with high degrees of GHG emissions in developed countries toward less polluting, carbon-neutral or carbon-negative activities in developing countries.

United Nations University (2012) 

Energy innovation and traditional knowledge: Renewables-based energy sovereignty can revitalize indigenous communities while mitigating climate change impacts.

The growing awareness of the reality of climate change and its accompanying impacts and risks is causing many to rethink current energy policies and to reconsider the reliance on conventional energy sources that have contributed to creating the global climate crisis.

Although many countries are looking toward low-carbon technologies and clean, renewable energy sources to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, fossil fuels are still our primary energy source, as illustrated in BP’s 2012 Statistical Review of World Energy.

United Nations Univeristy (2012) 

Inhabitants of the Eastern Pamir Mountains are pressured to overuse a highland shrub for firewood as imported fuel becomes too costly.

United Nations University (2012)

Inherkowinginambana, from Kowanyama - a coastal Aboriginal community in tropical Queensland, Australia - works with other local elders to protect Aboriginal country and culture.

“When that whole ocean comes and rises up, where are we going to go?” ponders Inherkowinginambana. “Every year it (the tide) comes in, it goes a bit further up once it hits the swamps, that will kill all the plant life, and the waterways.” As a traditional knowledge coordinator, Inherkowinginambana travels with the local rangers and various traditional owners to visit different cultural sites that are being rapidly changed by saltwater rise.

United Nations University (2012)

Kyrgyzstan shepherd Dootkasy and his wife Anarkul share their family's observations and traditional adaptations to a changing climate in highland pastures of Kyrgyzstan's Tian Shan Mountains.

United Nations University (2012)