It’s long been known that Indigenous communities around the planet are on the frontlines of climate change impacts. In a new international joint initiative, researchers led by Emilio Moran, a Hannah Distinguished Professor at MSU, will not only work with Indigenous communities to document the numerous challenges they face from climate change but will also collaborate with these communities to explore their innovations for addressing sustainability, adaptation, and mitigation. In particular, research will focus on finding more equitable and holistic solutions to climate change based on indigenous knowledge that will contribute to a more just energy transition.

The U.S. National Science Foundation funded the more than $650,000 grant after being submitted for consideration to the International Joint Initiative for Research on Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Competition and represents a partnership between researchers in the United States, Canada, Brazil, Germany, and Switzerland. In addition to Moran, who serves jointly with the MSU Department of Geography, Environment, and Spatial Sciences, the Center for Global Change and Earth Observations and the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, MSU team members will include Maria Claudia Lopez with the Department of Community Sustainability, Nathan Moore with the Department of Geography, Environment and Spatial Sciences, and Scott Stark with the Department of Forestry.

“We have an outstanding team with extensive regional expertise of vulnerable Indigenous and traditional populations. The Canadian team will lead work in the Arctic, while my team from the U.S. will focus on working with traditional Brazilian Amazon communities, an area I have spent a considerable amount of time working on during my career,” said Moran. “Teams will share their respective findings with our researchers around the globe while looking for ways to address risks to food security, water security, living standards, and critical infrastructure.”

Specifically, the team from MSU will map the current and future costs of energy transition on the health, well-being, and livelihoods of traditional peoples while identifying Indigenous innovations and actions that enhance food-water-energy security for these regions. The team will also examine new and innovative ways to manage forests and agriculture with few negative impacts and explore how to use these approaches in other areas and situations.

“I am particularly interested in learning how Indigenous practices may be utilized in other regions to enhance the cooling functions of forests,” said Scott Stark. “Many areas are experiencing reduced precipitation and hotter temperatures, and we need to find effective practices that will help reduce the frequency and intensity of flooding and drought events in these regions.”

“By working with indigenous and traditional peoples as partners in discovery, the project offers opportunities to these communities to become part of the voyage of discovery that is scientific research, and that is a really exciting aspect of this type of collaborative inquiry,” explained Moore. Lopez added, “education and training activities will be an integral part of this effort and it’s rewarding to know that we are helping prepare a new generation to address the climate challenges of tomorrow. For places like the Arctic and the Amazon, this means transitioning from carbon-based to renewable energy technologies and building a robust bio-economy based on healthy standing forests and free flowing rivers governed sustainably by vibrant and participatory local governance.”

The project will get underway this year and run through 2027. For more information, please visit Award Recipients: 2023 International Joint Initiative for Research in Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation.

This story originally appeared on the Department of Geography, Environment and Spatial Sciences website.