Personal Background and Motivation

• Speaker from Camiguin island, southern Philippines - "land of seven volcanoes and famous sweet lanzones fruits"
• Father was healer who taught forest respect ritual "Tabi apo!" ("Permit me")
• Father's teaching: "Spirits, forests, lanzones nurture us. You nurture them back. You work with the people who know how"
• Personal loss: fiancée (brave Indigenous young man) killed fighting illegal loggers
• Initially felt like coward for choosing "pen, not gun" - legal advocacy vs direct confrontation

Global Forest Crisis and Violence

• World's tropical rainforests being cut down, wildlife losing habitats
• 2020: over 200 Indigenous and environmental defenders killed
• Illegal logging linked to almost 1/3 of these murders
• Forest deaths = loss of climate crisis survival abilities
• COP26: governments, NGOs, corporations agreed to protect forests and land rights

Legal Defense Work in Philippines

• Set up legal defense organization as "barefoot lawyers"
• Indigenous peoples/activists tagged as communists when protesting
• Created 24/7 quick reaction teams for legal needs
• Led to passage of ancestral domain law in Philippines
  • Established Indigenous People's Commission
  • Recognized 4 million hectares of ancestral land claims

International Expansion

• Work shared with Indonesia's legal aid and legal rights defenders
• Strengthened Indonesia's Alliance of Indigenous Peoples
• Won forest land rights case in Indonesian court
• 476-million-strong Indigenous peoples protect 80% of world's biodiversity

Tenure Facility Overview

• Joined Stockholm-based Tenure Facility 5 years ago
• Finances mapping and legal defense of collective land rights
• Enables communities to protect themselves, forests, and nature
• Works with credible forest guardian communities
• Targets large tropical rainforest tracts in Amazon, Central America, Congo Basin, tropical Asia

Implementation Challenges

• Laws/policies exist to recognize rights but not implemented
• Communities and government partners lack support, funding, capacity
• Gap between promise and reality

Country-Specific Success Stories

Panama

• Assisted Federation of Indigenous Peoples COONAPIP and government ally
• Recognized 200,000 hectares Indigenous lands
• Now protect 1 million hectares Indigenous lands and forests with monitoring

Liberia

• Worked with 24 customary communities, government allies, women land rights groups
• Recognized and protect 600,000 hectares customary land and forests

Indonesia

• Assisted Alliance of Indigenous Peoples, farmers, women
• Advanced ancestral land claims and forests
• Buffer large forest tracts in Indonesia

Climate Impact and Solutions

• Protecting land/forest management rights = biodiversity protection
• Climate change solution with powerful leverage for mitigation
• Supports Indigenous intergenerational stewardship visions

Current Achievements (Since 2017)

• Indigenous peoples partners advanced land rights recognition up to 14 million hectares
• Benefitted 7 million people in 12 countries

Future Goals with TED Audacious Support

• Leverage momentum to expand, secure, protect up to 50 million hectares land and forests
• Reach 50 million forest guardians in next 5 years

Land Tenure as Bridge Solution

• Serves as bridge amid environmental destruction, conflict, criminalization
• Links unusual parties: Indigenous peoples, governments, private sector
• Creates common solution for sustainable planet

Positive Outcomes with Secure Tenure

• Conflicts resolved, less deforestation
• Women increased support as forest guardians, traditional knowledge holders, land use decision makers
• Indigenous youth returning home

Call to Action

• Indigenous peoples persist despite dangers, risk families/culture/lives for world's future
• "No one should have to die protecting forests"
• Everyone has choice to stand as allies, protect protectors, restore balance, survive climate crisis
• Final message: "Let us work with the people who know how"