20% for Indigenous Peoples: A New Standard for Climate Justice?

A new $5.5 billion climate fund proposed at the Belem summit may be setting a new global standard for climate justice. Brazil’s “Tropical Forests Forever Facility” includes a landmark mandate: 20 percent of all its funds must be allocated directly to Indigenous peoples.
This provision, central to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s proposal, is a clear acknowledgment that Indigenous communities are the most effective and experienced guardians of the world’s rainforests. After millennia of stewardship, they are finally being treated as key financial partners.
The fund itself is a “pay-to-preserve” mechanism. It will use its $5.5 billion in pledged capital, including $3 billion from Norway, to compensate 74 developing nations for halting deforestation.
This new model is financed by interest-bearing loans, a system designed to make conservation an economically superior choice to the destruction caused by logging and mining.
By hard-wiring Indigenous rights and payments into the financial architecture, the Belem proposal is a major step forward. It comes as UN Secretary-General António Guterres warns of the “moral failure” of the old-world order, which has failed to protect the public interest.