Biocultural Community Protocols and the Future of Conservation

On 17 July 2014, the Namibian, a local daily in Namibia, reported a rather momentous event: the development of a biocultural community protocol of the Kxoe community of the Bwabwata National Park — the first of its kind in Namibia.

Around 6,700 Kxoe people reside in Bwabwata National Park in Namibia’s West, and in the Kavango and Zambezi regions; they survive mainly as hunters and gatherers. The Kxoe developed the protocol with assistance from the Namibian Ministry of Environment and Tourism and Natural Justice. The protocol sought to articulate the Kxoe’s values, priorities, and procedures for decision-making around their resources, as well as set out their rights and responsibilities under customary, state, and international law. The protocol would be used as the basis for engaging with external actors such as the government, companies, academics, and non-governmental organizations, who seek access to the Kxoe lands, and traditional and genetic resources for research and development, commercialization, conservation, and other legal and policy frameworks. Read the full blog post by Kabir Sanjay Bavikatte here.

Terralingua Publishes Biocultural Diversiy Toolkit

With a view to making the concept and some of the applications of biocultural diversity more widely known to researchers, professionals, policy makers, and the general public, Terralingua has published the Biocultural Diversity Toolkit.

Since 1996, Terralingua has spearheaded research and applied work that have helped forge an integrated biocultural perspective on nature conservation and sustainable development: an approach that respects diversity in both nature and culture, and that recognizes the inextricable link between humans and the natural environment as vital to achieving human development in balance with nature. There are many hopeful signs of growing awareness of the critical importance of biocultural diversity for the vitality and resilience of our planet. Yet, stemming the continued erosion of life systems in both nature and culture requires a decisive effort to communicate, educate, share insights, and promote a new vision for human futures.

The Toolkit has 5  volumes:

1. Introduction to Biocultural Diversity;
2. Assessing the State of the World's Languages;
3. Assessing the Vitality of Traditional Environmental Knowledge;
4. Documenting and Revitalizing OralTraditions; and
5. Biocultural Approaches to Conservation and Development.

By bringing together several results of their work,  Terralingua  have assembled this publication, to help increase understanding of the complex changes that are weakening the biocultural fabric of life, and to foster action to counter this trend. They have drawn from collaborations with key partners, including Natural Justice, with a chapter on Community Protocols by Kabir Sanjay Bavikatte and Harry Jonas in the 5th volume.

Natural Justice Engagement in Mutare, Zimbabwe

Natural Justice worked with members of the Marange and Arda Transsau communities from 7-8 July in Manicaland in Zimbabwe, to support the development of the community's biocultural community protocol. All were involved in peer-to-peer learning activities designed to support the collection of materials for the community's biocultural community protocol. Activities included institution and resource mapping, mapping of community and other development activities within the communities, now and historically, development of historical timelines and role play activities.

The two day workshop was an incredibly rich opportunity to engage in endogenous development and participatory action research methodologies by Natural Justice and community members alike.

Call for Applications for Volunteer Internship: Natural Justice, India

Natural Justice: Lawyers for Communities and the Environmentis a non-profit organization registered in South Africa, with offices in India, Malaysia and New York City. We assist communities to engage with legal frameworks to secure environmental and social justice. Our mission is to facilitate full and effective participation of Indigenous peoples and local communities in the development and implementation of laws and policies relating to conservation and customary uses of biodiversity and the protection of associated cultural heritage. Natural Justice works at the local, regional, national, and international levels with a range of partners.

Natural Justice (India) is inviting applications for volunteer interns to support our work around extractive industries in Orissa. This project is part of an inter-regional action-research project with case studies in five countries across the world, including India. The project explores the development and use of bio-cultural community protocols as a tool to facilitate conflict transformation by enabling communities to engage constructively with extractive industries and other external actors, to secure their rights and interests.

Duration: We would prefer the internship to begin on 10th June 2014, for a minimum period of 3 weeks, but the position may be open beyond that.

Location: Please note that the intern will be required to work out of Bangalore, India for the entire duration of internship.

The intern will be required to work on analysing legal issues in this context. Specific responsibilities of the intern will include –

• Assisting with review and analysis of various legislations, policies, notifications etc. applicable in the context of mining in Orissa;
• Review and analysis of case laws;
• Analysis of international law relating to the rights of indigenous and local communities over their territories and resources;
• Assisting with analysis of current state of play with regard to extractive industries in India;
• Filing and follow-up of RTI applications on specific questions, as and when required; and
• Assisting with writing relevant reports and articles.

Prerequisites:

• A law degree, or current enrolment in the 3rd-5th year of 5-year LLB programmes or 2nd-3rd year of 3-year LLB programmes;
• A keen interest in advancing the rights of local communities to govern their territories and resources, especially in the context of extractive industries;
• Strong analytical skills, with an ability and interest to do in-depth research into legislations and case laws;
• Fluency in English with good writing skills;
• Willingness to work in a flexible working environment; and
• Previous experience working with communities and/or civil society organizations will be considered beneficial.

Natural Justice is a close-knit and nurturing collective that places a high premium on facilitating the personal and professional growth of its staff and interns. We will offer the chance to work with a dynamic and highly passionate global team of legal practitioners and gain valuable international experience.

If you are interested, please send a CV and letter of interest to arpitha(at)naturaljustice(dot)org(dot)za and stella(at)naturaljustice(dot)org(dot)za. For those who wish to begin in June, kindly send in your applications by 11th May 2014. For later periods, applications will be accepted on a rolling basis.

Thank you in advance for your applications!

Quito II: Second Dialogue Held in Ecuador to Discuss Methods for Financing Biological Diversity

Braulio Souza (centre), Executive Secretary
to the CBD, gives closing remarks at the meeting.

There is no question that biological diversity is being lost at an unsustainable rate and that this trend needs to be halted through a variety of different approaches. Important questions exist, however, about how to pay for those approaches. To help answer those questions, several governments, as well as the European Commission and the CBD Secretariat, convened a meeting in Ecuador called the Second Dialogue Seminar on Scaling up Finance for Biodiversity from 9-12 April 2014 to discuss issues regarding financing biological diversity.

Representatives from governments, intergovernmental organizations (IGOs), NGOs and other organizations presented on a broad range of topics in plenary sessions, including: CBD and UN efforts in the area of financing (the High Level Panel on Resourcing and the Biodiversity Finance Initiative); the Global Environmental Facility's strategy for the next four years; and community monitoring of biodiversity. Jael Eli Makagon from Natural Justice presented on community protocols as a way of ensuring the full participation of Indigenous peoples and local communities in biodiversity financing. Several small group sessions were held, during which specific questions were asked by the organizers regarding many different topics, including perverse subsidies, taxation issues, and the Sustainable Development Goals.

Held under the Chatham House Rule, the meeting was a valuable opportunity for participants to come together outside of the formal setting of CBD COPs and intersessionals to discuss issues related to biodiversity finance. It is clear that issues around biodiversity financing, including the validity of assigning an economic value to biodiversity and the question whether the private sector should be involved are still up for debate. Unfortunately at this stage, participation on the part of Indigenous peoples and local communities in decisions related to financing biodiversity appears to be quite low. This is a challenge for all stakeholders, especially governments and IGOs involved in biodiversity finance to be as inclusive as possible in designing and implementing finance mechanisms.

One of the major goals of the meeting is to facilitate discussions to inform the upcoming meetings of the Working Group on Review of Implementation of the Convention (WGRI, June 2014) and COP-12 (October 2014). It is important for stakeholders to be aware of the ongoing discussions and decisions regarding financing biodiversity, as many important issues are still being discussed and decided upon, and WGRI and COP-12 will both likely focus on issues of financing biodiversity. For more information on Quito II, the Co-Chairs have written a report that that is available on the here.

ABS and BCP Workshop in Zeerust, South Africa

A workshop on the international legislative framework and the South African domestic laws relating to access and benefit sharing was held in Zeerust, South Africa on 9 and 10 April 2013. This workshop was the second of three workshops in a pilot project funded by the Department of Science and Technology and the National Research Institute, and organised by the Indigenous Knowledge Systems unit of the Medical Research Council of South Africa. Laureen Manuel and Stephanie Booker of Natural Justice conducted the workshop, which included presentations and training on biocultural community protocols (BCPs).

The participants of the workshop included committee members and youth from the Mokgola community in Zeerust. The topics covered the international and domestic law on Access and Benefit Sharing, specifically the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Nagoya Protocol, and the National Environmental Management: Biodiversity Act and Bioprospecting, Access and Benefit Sharing Regulations of South Africa.

The presentation and group discussions on BCPs revealed some community tensions which ended in concurrence that there needs to be more discussion within the community to reach agreement on certain issues.

Major New Partnership - National Khoi-San Council and Natural Justice

NKC Chairperson Cecil Le Fleur
signing the MoU

Natural Justice has established a ground-breaking relationship with South Africa’s National Khoi-San Council (NKC), the government-convened body of representatives from Khoe and San communities of South Africa. Natural Justice’s Lesle Jansen, Laureen Manuel and Johan Lorenzen presented Natural Justice’s proposed partnership with the NKC, which the Open Society Initiative of Southern Africa (OSISA) has agreed to support, to the Council from 6-7 November, 2012, in Bloemfontein, South Africa. A memorandum of understanding committing both parties to the completion of the proposed activities was signed between Natural Justice and NKC on November 7, 2012.  

Natural Justice will support NKC to achieve three objectives through the partnership:

• Support the Council in having meaningful consultations amongst Council communities, members and with government;

• Engage in legal training for the NKC around the National Traditional Affairs Bill and its continued negotiations;

• Consult with Khoe and San communities to draft a self-governance model based on the human rights issues set out in the UN Mission report recommendations of 2005. 

The initial partnership is for 12 months but it is hoped that this will be the foundation of an enduring relationship.