Photo: Donson / Adobe Stock
By Cristina Orpheo and Graciela Hopstein
Traditional, indigenous, quilombola, riverside communities, communities on the outskirts of large Brazilian cities and political minorities in general are the social groups most affected by climate change.
This is already a tangible fact in Brazil, just look at the extreme weather events that have intensified in recent times. From the current unprecedented drought in the Amazon, which has put the health and livelihood of populations in the territory at risk, to heavy rains and tornadoes that caused almost a hundred deaths on the north coast of São Paulo and Rio Grande do Sul.
On the other hand, these groups and political minorities are also the main protectors of forests and act in defense of the environment, their territories and natural resources, often having their lives threatened, a situation that further deepens and aggravates the social and political impacts caused by the climate crisis
Despite being at the center of this issue, for a long time the leaders of these groups and civil society in general were outside the debates and decision-making spaces of the Climate COPs.
COP21, held in 2015, generated the Paris Agreement and placed the climate agenda as strategically linked to the human rights agenda. The participation of these groups begins to become more significant after COP26, held in 2021 in Glasgow, Scotland. Civil society was present in force, showing itself to be even more attentive and mobilized in the search for solutions for their territories, taking their demands and messages directly to the center of global debates.
A movement that was repeated last year, at COP27, in Egypt, with significant participation from Brazilian civil society, which connected around these agendas in a pavilion created exclusively for this purpose, Hub Brasil. And that tends to be maintained and/or expanded now at COP28, which takes place this year in Dubai.
In this context, philanthropy can play a fundamental role in tackling the climate crisis as, through financial support, it seeks to strengthen groups and political minorities that work on the front line, encouraging the creation and implementation of local solutions, in accordance with the which they determine as a priority to generate the necessary transformations in their communities and territories. And here we are not referring to mainstream philanthropy, but to community philanthropy, understood as a practice based on the transformative power of grassroots movements, groups and organizations present in all Brazilian biomes, which play a crucial role in regulating the planet's climate. .
The field of Brazilian philanthropy is quite broad and diverse, as it ranges from business and family foundations to independent justice funds created by civil society leaders and activists. In the context of this analysis, we want to highlight the strategic and differentiated place that philanthropy has, independent of socio-environmental justice, when it focuses on supporting civil society, recognizing its leading role in processes of social transformation.
In Brazil, there is a group of independent philanthropic organizations that support initiatives in the field of socio-environmental justice – 16 of them are part of the Comuá Network – and which work to democratize and guarantee access to financial resources for the development of initiatives capable of implementing local solutions to the challenges faced by communities, thus contributing to the recognition and access to rights, especially for political minorities.
Although in the context of the climate emergency there are pledges to donate on an increasing scale – many of them originating from international cooperation and philanthropy – local populations and organizations working with climate finance argue that a significant proportion of the resources do not reach them directly.
At COP26, for example, several countries and organizations – the UK, USA, Germany, Norway and the Netherlands, together with 17 foundations – announced the Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities' Forest Tenure Pledge, a commitment to donate US$ 1.7 billion, from 2021 to 2025, so that original peoples and traditional communities continue to protect their territories and play a crucial role in the fight against the climate crisis.
One year after the announcement, the initiative's annual report contains data showing that US$ 321,629,749 had been donated, of which half (51%) was channeled to international NGOs that operate projects with indigenous peoples and traditional populations. Governments kept 17% of this amount, followed by regional agencies or funds (8%0. Only 7% of the resources were made available directly to indigenous organizations and traditional populations.
Many factors make it difficult for climate finance to reach local communities: complexity of financing processes, difficulties in accessing information, language barriers, political difficulties, among other causes.
Solving these problems requires an integrated approach between different actors, including community-based civil society, which needs to occupy a prominent place in this dynamic. At the same time, providing accurate information about financing processes, coordinating efforts so that resources reach these communities in a decolonized way, become strategic actions to face the climate crisis.
Expanding access for communities and populations heavily affected by climate change to decision-making spaces, such as COPs, is a strategic action. In 2021, the Casa Socioambiental Fund, one of the founders of Rede Comuá, took to COP27, which took place in Egypt, a delegation of 14 people from the most diverse struggles: quilombolas, popular lawyers from the Amazon, local and regional voices for energy production renewable in a distributed way, among others.
Local independent donor organizations – which, according to a recent mapping, there are more than 30 in Brazil – play a hugely important role in ensuring that resources land where they need to and should reach. These organizations directly support initiatives developed by local communities and have a history of success in this action.
These donations are certainly more agile and flexible than other forms of financing, allowing for a faster and more effective response to local climate challenges. These funds are not project executors, but contribute as partners in the transformation process by mobilizing and donating resources so that civil society groups, leaders and organizations can implement the solutions they believe are necessary and a priority for their realities.
In the Global South there are several local independent donor organizations, strongly consolidated, with great expertise in managing and donating resources, monitoring and evaluating projects, and with enormous experience in directly supporting traditional and local communities.
How to make this resource reach is the big answer that the international field is looking for, and there are already easily accessible solutions to make this happen. The independent donor organizations that are part of Rede Comuá, for example, are one of them. They donate millions of dollars to thousands of community-based groups, across all the most important social and environmental justice issues. And, increasingly, each of these supports is directly connected to climate justice, which is the great challenge of our time.
Donating to facilitate solutions for communities, movements and groups that suffer most seriously from the effects of the climate, which are also those that contribute most to its mitigation, is a clear human rights agenda, and fundamental in Brazil. Only with a society whose rights to voice and effective participation are guaranteed will there be climate justice.
Cristina Orpheo She is the executive director of Fundo Casa Socioambiental, graduated in Administration, with a postgraduate degree in social project management, third sector and environmental management. He has 20 years of experience in project design and management, project development, strategic planning and resource mobilization. For the last 13 years, he has worked in Grantmaking to support traditional and local populations and also in the field of national and international philanthropy.
Graciela Hopstein is executive director of Rede Comuá. Master in education (UFF) and PhD in Social Policy. Consultant, teacher and researcher in the social area. Author of articles and books on themes linked to public policies, social movements and philanthropy.
