WARNING FOR TRIBES!
CARBON OFFSETS THREATEN INDIGENOUS SOVEREIGNTY: justice, economy, environment, culture, rights and future FOR 100 YEARS – Carbon Forest Offsets sound like easy money…
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Millions and even billions of dollars are promised if a Native Nation just signs on the dotted line. We are told we are finally being recognized and paid to be guardians of the land. But before you whip out your pen and decide how to spend all that money, which may not even materialize, look for your reading glasses because the fine print of many carbon offset contracts threatens your sovereignty by including a waiver of your sovereignty, and hands your land over to the governments and the polluters responsible for climate change for a century,i if not, more.
Furthermore, carbon markets crash and close without warning.ii Carbon offsets are very risky, expensiveiii and bad business. Most carbon offset projects violate Native rights and prohibit aspects of Tribal culture, ceremony and land management systems such as prescribed burn. In addition, carbon trading does not cut emissions at source, and actually increases pollution and makes global warming worse. As reported in other IEN Sky Protector Briefings, carbon trading and offsets give fossil fuel industries the right to pollute. Therefore, Tribal carbon offset projects make your territory more prone to wildfires, floods, droughts or other severe unpredictable weather disasters, leaving little for future generations. It is often difficult to reconcile with many Tribal spiritual teachings the participation in these carbon trading and offset programs, which are only forms of privatization of air, trees, biodiversity and of Life. Maybe signing that contract isn’t such a good idea, after all…
SELLING CARBON OFFSETS THREATENS TRIBAL SOVEREIGNTY
To sell carbon offsets with forests,iv grasslands,v rangelandsvi or farming, a Tribe has to sign a legally binding contract to waive some Tribal sovereignty. For example, to sell forest offsets in California’s cap-and-trade market, Tribes must sign “a limited waiver of sovereign immunity” aka give up some sovereignty to do the carbon offset project. According to the State of California’s Offset Project Listing Requirements for Native American Tribes:vii “Tribes, because of their unique status as sovereign nations, must include a limited waiver of sovereign immunity that is legally binding under the Tribe’s laws as part of the offset project…”viii As the following article explains, even to list potential carbon credits for California’s carbon market, the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation in Washington State had to sign a limited waiver of their sovereignty to sell permits to pollute to the infamous oil giant British Petroleum (BP).ix
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