Indigenous Peoples Are Essential to Protecting Biodiversity
FSC IF
On this International Day for Biological Diversity, FSC-IF’s Managing Director, Minnie Degawan, highlights the vital role of Indigenous Peoples in protecting biodiversity and sustaining life for future generations.
“For us, biodiversity is life.” – Minnie Degawan
For Indigenous Peoples across the world, biodiversity is not only about protecting nature. It is a way of life rooted in responsibility, stewardship, and intergenerational knowledge.
For generations, Indigenous Peoples have worked at the local level to sustain ecosystems and protect biodiversity. Yet despite their contributions, policies affecting natural resources are too often developed without their meaningful participation. In many cases, Indigenous communities continue to face displacement from their lands due to extractive industries or conservation approaches that fail to respect their rights and knowledge systems.
As we mark Biodiversity Day, we must move beyond acknowledgement and take meaningful action to support Indigenous Peoples’ rights to lands, territories, self-determination, and resources.
Protect Indigenous rights, protect biodiversity.
Support Indigenous-led action for people and planet:
Indigenous voices in Chiang Mai, Oaxaca, Yeosu, New York, and Bonn.
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Photos: Minnie Degawan: FSC/Christoph Söldner, other photos: FSC-IF
PIPC Asia Regional Meeting:
In Chiang Mai, a crucial dialogue unfolded, where Indigenous leaders challenged systems, shared lived realities, and reimagined the future of forest governance in Asia.
UNPFII in New York:
“Ensuring Indigenous Peoples’ health, including in the context of conflict.”
Protect their rights. Protect the Forests. Protect the Earth.
From March 21 to 22, the FSC Indigenous Foundation organized the “Indigenous Forest Stewardship: Navigating FSC Certification in Asia” meeting. A diverse group of Indigenous leaders, FSC-IF and FSC representatives, and regional stakeholders gathered in Chiang Mai, Thailand, for a critical dialogue on the future of forest governance in Asia. What emerged was not just a technical discussion about certification systems, but a powerful reflection on rights, resilience, and the lived realities of Indigenous Peoples navigating restrictive state policies and corporate pressures.
From the beginning, participants made one thing clear: Forest certification cannot be separated from the broader context of Indigenous rights. Across Asia, Indigenous Peoples continue to face shrinking access to their ancestral lands, restrictive state policies, and competing economic pressures.
The Tension Between Standards and Reality
The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) positions itself as a global leader in responsible forest management, with over 117 million hectares certified worldwide. Furthermore, FSC has 10 principles and three are most relevant to Indigenous Peoples:
Principle 2: maintain or improve the social and economic well-being of workers;
Principle 3: uphold the rights of Indigenous Peoples
Principle 9: maintain or improve high conservation values; including cultural and spiritual sites.
These principles provide formal entry points for advancing Indigenous rights within the FSC system. Yet, the dialogue revealed a persistent gap between these commitments and their implementation on the ground.
A pressing concern was raised around FPIC. For many Indigenous participants, FPIC is not merely a procedural step but a fundamental expression of self-determination. Stories shared during the gathering illustrated how, in practice, communities are often consulted too late, or not at all, while decisions about their lands move forward. The fear is that ongoing revisions to FSC standards could weaken FPIC, turning a substantive right into a checkbox exercise.
Mr. Nicolas Mujah, FSC-IF Council member, also mentioned how communities can engage in grievance procedures to challenge violations:
“FPIC is important to integrate into FSC. In FSC, there’s a remedy framework: if you feel you have been criminalized, you can start with the complaint mechanism.”
Participants agreed that FSC and similar certification mechanisms must provide transparent and effective complaint and remedy processes. Complaint mechanisms can be anonymized to protect human rights defenders, but systemic support and follow-up are missing, undermining accountability.
Structural Barriers to Participation
A central theme of the dialogue was participation: who gets to shape the rules.
FSC’s governance structure, built around economic, social, and environmental chambers, is designed to balance interests. However, participants highlighted significant barriers for Indigenous Peoples. Membership fees, technical complexity, limited voting power, and uneven access to these mechanisms, all restrict meaningful engagement. For many forest-dependent communities, simply navigating the system can be overwhelming, especially for Indigenous communities with limited resources and adequate support.
However, despite these challenges, several engagement mechanisms were highlighted by Jacki Yeung, FSC Membership Manager for Asia Pacific:
Participation in General Assembly motions and voting processes
Involvement in chamber discussions and working groups
Engagement in consultations and policy development platforms
Participants emphasised that while individual membership may appear limited, collective organizing within chambers can strengthen Indigenous influence.
A Path Forward, Reform and Collaboration
Despite the challenges, the tone of the gathering was not one of resignation, but of cautious determination.
Participants called for concrete reforms within FSC recognizing that current structures are insufficient to protect Indigenous rights, including reducing barriers to membership, strengthening Indigenous representation, and ensuring that standards are consistently enforced. There was also a strong emphasis on collective action, organizing within chambers, building regional networks, and developing shared messages for global platforms.
On the last day of the dialogue, the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights were highlighted as a complementary tool, particularly in strengthening accountability and access to remedies. As mandatory due diligence laws begin to emerge in several countries, there is growing potential to align certification systems with broader legal frameworks.
Conclusion, From Participation to Power
The gathering underscored a critical moment for forest governance in Asia. FSC and similar systems hold significant potential, but their legitimacy depends on their ability to deliver on their promises.
For Indigenous Peoples, the question is not whether to engage, but how to transform these systems so they truly reflect their rights, knowledge, and leadership.
Overall, the gathering was eye opening and created a space for critical reflections, with participants expressing appreciation for the opportunity to share experiences and challenge existing systems.
“I learned a lot about FSC and PIPC. Thank you for the learning exchange; understanding each other’s challenges and experiences made it truly meaningful and successful. I also hope there will be more youth involvement.”
Indigenous women, their rights, and Mother Nature’s protection
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Across the world, women continue to lead change in their families, communities, and ecosystems. Among them, Indigenous women stand out as vital guardians of nature, holders of knowledge systems that sustain biodiversity, protect ecosystems, and help communities adapt to climate change. Yet their contributions are still too often overlooked in policy making, research, and public discourse.
International Women’s Day offers an opportunity not only to reflect on the inequalities women continue to face, but also to recognize their profound contributions to society and to the planet. In many Indigenous communities, women play central roles in sustaining cultural traditions while protecting the natural environments on which their communities depend.
As Indigenous leader Aissatou Ibrahim reflects on the meaning of the day:
“For me, International Women’s Day is simply a way of valuing even the little things that women do, even within the home. In the morning, it is she who wakes up earlier than everyone else, and it is she who goes to bed later than everyone else. Therefore, without women there is no life. Without women there is also no joy in the home. A house without a woman is like a house in darkness.”
Her words remind us that the everyday contributions of women, often invisible or undervalued, are fundamental to the well-being of families, communities, and societies.
When these contributions remain unseen, their knowledge is also excluded from environmental policies and conservation strategies. As a result, valuable opportunities to strengthen sustainable ecosystem management are lost.
Knowledge carriers and climate observers
In many Indigenous communities, women hold deep knowledge about plants, animals, weather patterns, and ecosystems. This knowledge is developed through generations of observation, experience, and cultural practice, and it plays an essential role in sustaining both livelihoods and biodiversity.
Aissatou describes the depth of this knowledge in her community:
“It is the woman who knows where to find herbs, trees, and leaves, whether for food, for healing, for teaching, or for expanding that knowledge and traditional wisdom.”
This understanding of nature extends far beyond the use of plants. Indigenous women closely observe seasonal changes, animal behavior, and environmental signals that help communities anticipate climate conditions.
As Aissatou explains:
“Women know how to predict the weather. When it will be hot, when it will rain, what the season will be like, whether it will be long or short, whether there will be floods or drought.”
These observations are vital in regions where livelihoods depend closely on natural cycles. Women often guide decisions about planting seasons, the use of natural resources, and the movement of animals, helping communities adapt to changing environmental conditions.
Challenges and pressures
Despite their essential role in environmental stewardship, Indigenous women continue to face significant challenges. Many Indigenous territories are increasingly threatened by deforestation, extractive industries, and land encroachment, placing both ecosystems and traditional livelihoods at risk.
At the same time, social inequalities and gender discrimination often limit women’s participation in environmental decision-making. Recognizing Indigenous women’s rights, including their land rights, cultural rights, and leadership in environmental governance, is therefore essential for both gender justice and biodiversity protection.
Indigenous identity and the future
Despite these challenges, Indigenous women continue to demonstrate resilience, leadership, and determination.
For Aissatou, Indigenous identity is a source of pride and strength:
“Being indigenous means having traditional knowledge and wisdom, having an identity, being connected to a territory in one way or another.”
This connection to land and culture shapes how Indigenous communities understand their responsibility to protect nature and sustain their way of life.
Aissatou also shares an inspiring message for younger generations:
“Young women, this message is for you. Be proud of who you are. Be very happy to be Indigenous, whatever your people, your country, or your origin.”
“Being indigenous is an opportunity that we must never let slip away, and we must care for and protect our community, our identity, our culture, and our traditional knowledge.”
Today, as we mark International Women’s Day, it is important to remember that the protection of nature and the advancement of women’s rights are deeply interconnected.
The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) and the FSC Indigenous Foundation recognize the vital role Indigenous women play in protecting forests, sustaining biodiversity, and strengthening community resilience. Learn more about how the FSC collaborates with Indigenous Peoples in various ways to create shared opportunities.
