- The government in Suriname announced an offering of the world’s first sovereign carbon credits through the UNFCCC Paris Agreement framework, allowing the country to issue and trade carbon credits with other countries and the private sector.
- But communities living in the forests that made the credits possible say the government rushed the process and didn’t take them into account, leaving many of them in the dark about how the program works and what the benefits are.
- Indigenous and Tribal peoples would receive just 10% of carbon credit revenue from the program, according to government documents reviewed by Mongabay. But the communities don’t understand how it will be distributed.
Local and Indigenous communities in Suriname are speaking out about a new carbon credit trading scheme that they say the government pushed through without consulting them. They’re worried they’ve been left out of forest conservation policies and revenue sharing tied to land that they have ancestral claims to.
The government in Suriname announced an offering of the world’s first sovereign carbon credits through the UNFCCC Paris Agreement framework, allowing the country to issue and trade carbon credits with other countries and the private sector. But communities living in the forests that made the credits possible say the government rushed the process and didn’t take them into account.
“The people who’ve really been caring for the forest and who need to be strengthened first and foremost are kind of a side note. They’re kind of an afterthought,” John Goedschalk, head of Climate Change Advisory Services, told Mongabay. “…The government put together this whole process and this whole system, and then they went to the communities and said, ‘Oh, by the way, this is it.’ I mean, that’s just wrong on so many levels.”
Carbon credits allow businesses and countries to offset their greenhouse gas emissions, in many cases by applying the credits to rainforests with high levels of biodiversity. Rainforest carbon credits in Suriname are meant to preserve the Amazon and cancel out other emissions abroad.
Suriname is covered by approximately 93% Amazon Rainforest and is one of the only countries in the world with net-negative carbon emissions, positioning it as a potential leader for the emerging carbon credit market. It’s the first country to offer these types of carbon credits — officially known as Internationally Transferred Mitigation Outcomes (ITMOs) — as laid out in the Paris Agreement.
The country’s ability to conserve so much forest cover is largely due to Indigenous and Afro-descendent peoples who have actively defended the rainforest from mining, agriculture and logging despite not having their land rights officially recognized by the government.
They say they were largely left out of the development of the new carbon credit program in the months leading up to its launch.
They weren’t approached about it until weeks before the official announcement, leaders said, while other communities weren’t consulted at all, a violation of their right to Free, Prior and Informed Consent, a consultation process that allows them to make decisions about their land.
The government has had a community-capacity building and consultation process built into its carbon credit plans for a decade, but didn’t apply it in this case, Goedschalk said.
“Once again, the government of Suriname shows how little it knows about, and shows respect for, the rights of Indigenous peoples and Tribal peoples,” community leaders said in an August letter to the government. “…We are rights holders, and not just stakeholders, and should be approached as such.”
The letter was sent by the Collaboration of Tribal Peoples in Suriname (KAMPOS), a collective representing the country’s African descendant groups, and the Association of Indigenous Village Leaders (VIDS), which represents all 51 Indigenous villages in Suriname.
Even after a presentation from the government, many communities said they were left with questions. The program includes a “grievance mechanism” that allows residents to voice their concerns, but they say they don’t understand how it works or how much influence it actually has. The program is run by “sector specific ministers and the president,” according to the presentation they were given, so it’s unclear who residents should file complaints to.
They also say they’re getting mixed messages about revenue sharing.
Officials said the carbon credit program would provide “economic, social and governance benefits to the local and Indigenous communities” by returning at least 95% of proceeds to the country. But government documents reviewed by Mongabay reveal that Indigenous and Tribal peoples would receive just 10% of carbon credit revenue, while 40% would go into the national budget and 20% would go into the country’s sovereign wealth fund. The rest would go into development and sector management.
Indigenous and Tribal groups don’t know if the 10% is a fair figure or how it will be divided between them.
Minister of Spatial Planning and the Environment Marciano Dasai spoke about Suriname’s carbon credit scheme at the Climate Investment Summit in June, two months before the official launch. Yet at that time, none of the Indigenous and Tribal communities had been consulted, according to KAMPOS and VIDS.
The ministry didn’t respond to a request for comment for this article.
“The fact that the government only advised us about what their plans were after they had put it on paper is something that’s problematic for Indigenous and Tribal people,” KAMPOS president Renate Simson said.
Suriname launched the carbon credit scheme with ITMO Ltd and BancTrust Investment Bank Limited. They spoke with at least 91 clients before May, according to the government documents Mongabay reviewed. Most of them were large corporations like PetroChina, a state-owned oil and gas company.
They have ongoing discussions with Singapore, the E.U., Korea and the U.K., according to the documents.
Communities are waiting for a response to the letter they sent officials this month. They’re hoping to pause the program until their complaints can be considered. In the meantime, they’re discussing possible actions against the government or appealing to an international body like the U.N. or Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
“The government needs to just really quickly get around the table and start doing appropriate consultations with [the communities],” Goedschalk said.
Banner image: A protest against logging in Suriname. Photo by Riano Gunther/ILC.
See related from this reporter:
As logging booms in Suriname, forest communities race to win land rights
FEEDBACK: Use this form to send a message to the author of this post. If you want to post a public comment, you can do that at the bottom of the page.
Credits
