A/HRC/54/31 contracts written in English, with communities being pushed out of their lands for projects.63 Indigenous Peoples are seeking to train themselves in carbon market regulation, to better understand the mechanics and avoid falling victim to carbon pirates. Forest-offsetting schemes are often found on land belonging to Indigenous Peoples whose rights have not been secured. The main protection against this trend is to recognize their right to land as part of any carbon-offsetting agreements. Considering that Indigenous Peoples are the best stewards for protecting forests, this fundamental safeguard can only serve the wider goal of greenhouse gas emissions reduction. 49. A 2021 study revealed that of the 31 countries that contain almost 70 per cent of the world’s tropical forests, only around one quarter of them explicitly recognized the rights of communities to govern and benefit from carbon rights. Just five countries have defined how carbon and non-carbon benefits will be shared, with only Viet Nam having an operational benefit-sharing scheme.64 50. At the twenty-sixth Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, countries agreed on regulations to enhance the environmental integrity and transparency of market-based activities under article 6 of the Paris Agreement. Article 6 (2) of the Paris Agreement allows countries to trade emissions reductions and removals with one another through bilateral or multilateral agreements and article 6 (4) creates a global carbon market to be overseen by a supervisory body designated by the Conference of the Parties. At the twenty-seventh Conference of the Parties, Indigenous Peoples discussed with States parties how to ensure that they did not bear the brunt of carbonoffsetting projects and instead benefited from increased direct financial flows for forest protection, conservation and improved livelihood opportunities. 51. Carbon finance stakeholders should adopt high-integrity, rights-based approaches to secure the collective rights of Indigenous Peoples to their lands and resources, adopt human rights safeguards, including free, prior and informed consent, and secure their participation in projects from initial design to implementation, monitoring and reporting. Integrity should include transparent information about the final buyer of credits, as in many cases credits are used as offsets by companies whose activities are damaging the territories of Indigenous Peoples. Additionally, they should provide accessible grievance redress mechanisms and increase direct financing support for community-led initiatives.65 52. Financial actors will rely heavily on the assessment of certifying entities before directing funds towards a REDD-plus or other carbon-sinking project. Indigenous Peoples and NGOs have expressed concerns over the lack of transparency and independence of the entities in charge of certifying the carbon emission reduction units of carbon projects and the lack of adequate, independent and accessible grievance mechanisms. 66 Additionally, processes may not always include respect for the rights of Indigenous Peoples among the criteria for certification, or as a framework to decide cases brought before their complaint mechanisms. For instance, even where the REDD-plus environmental excellence standard used by the certifier, Architecture for REDD+ Transition, recalls the Cancun safeguards, the certifier’s complaint mechanism failed to apply an Indigenous Peoples human rights framework to decide a recent case concerning Indigenous Peoples. 67 53. Some States have strengthened the participation of Indigenous Peoples in the regulation of carbon and biodiversity offset markets. In Canada, Indigenous Peoples have participated in the development of federal offset protocols under the country’s greenhouse gas offset credit system and the Government is working on free, prior and informed consent mechanisms to develop federal offset protocols for land-based projects that will be applicable 63 64 65 66 67 GE.23-13366 See https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/21/amazon-indigenous-communitiescarbon-offsetting-pirates-aoe. Rights and Resources Initiative and McGill University, “Status of legal recognition of Indigenous Peoples’, local communities’ and Afro-descendant Peoples’ rights to carbon stored in tropical lands and forests” (2021). See https://www.energymonitor.ai/policy/carbon-markets/the-interwoven-fortunes-of-carbonmarkets-and-indigenous-communities/. See https://www.elclip.org/resguardo-indigena-cumbal-bonos-de-carbono (in Spanish). See https://www.artredd.org/complaints/. 13