Natives are the best custodians of the ecosystems they inhabit, in some cases for thousands of years — the indigenous peoples' rights organisation Survival has always maintained this. Further confirmation comes from Guatemala, where a new study on the importance of rural communities in wildfire prevention has been presented.

The right to land

According to the research, presented last week by Italian Stefano Gatto, the European Union's ambassador to Guatemala, guaranteeing land rights to indigenous peoples living in rural areas would significantly reduce the risk of fires, providing far more effective prevention than that offered by the government.

The paradise of biodiversity on fire

The researchers, led by Andrew Davis, director of the Asociación de comunidades forestales de Petén (Acofop), analysed Nasa satellite images of the Maya Biosphere Reserve, a vast protected area characterised by incredible biodiversity rich in endemic species. The researchers found that almost all the fires that broke out in 2017 occurred outside the zones managed by local communities, which make up over 16 per cent of the reserve. The majority of fires recorded to date have therefore affected large areas of forest under the protection of the national government.

Fires and climate change

The number, intensity and duration of wildfires is increasing across the world as a result of climate change. In 2015, extraordinarily violent fires devastated Alaska and Indonesia; the following year it was the turn of Canada, California and Spain. This year, meanwhile, flames engulfed several Chilean regions, and we still have before our eyes the terrible images of the fire that killed dozens of people and scorched hectares of forest in Portugal. According to the Union of Concerned Scientists (Ucs), in recent decades the number of fires has increased, particularly in the western United States, due to rising global temperatures. The number of fires has quintupled over the past forty years, and flames spread across areas six times larger than in the past and burn for almost five times as long. Fires in turn contribute to fuelling global warming, as trees that burn release the enormous quantities of carbon dioxide they have absorbed, making a significant contribution to greenhouse gas emissions.

How to prevent fires

The problem of wildfires therefore concerns the entire planet, and there is an urgent need to find a shared and effective solution. This solution, as is often the case with complex problems, would actually be quite simple, as the forest communities of Guatemala have demonstrated: entrusting the management of forests to local communities.

The guardians of the forest

The study — the first to compare fire incidence rates in concession areas and "free" areas — thus confirms a series of recent studies demonstrating that the most effective way to protect forests is to hand control to the communities that live in them. Nature conservation and the sustainable management of natural resources are indeed an integral part of the lives of indigenous communities, who are part of the forest and know all its animals and the medicinal properties of its plants. The Awá of Brazil, for example, know at least 275 useful plants and 31 species of bee, while the Yanomami Indians use around 500 different plant species on a daily basis and know which trees, once fallen, provide edible insect larvae.