Assessment of the first week of COP30

Belém, COP30 territory

The intensity of a COP is, in itself, a factor to consider. However, holding a climate COP in the heart of the Amazon is on another level. Belém, capital of the State of Pará, has a long history and frequently leads deforestation in the Legal Amazon, in terms of absolute deforested area, between 2019 and 2024 (MapaBiomas).  It is also the scenario in which looks, interests, disputes and hopes about the future of the forest are concentrated. With a population of about 1.3 million inhabitants, Services and Information in Brazil, the city already feels, in its body and in its daily life, the effects of climate change: intense and muggy heat, heavy rains, flooding, congested traffic and deep socio-spatial inequalities.

At the same time, Belém expresses the strength of Amazonian miscegenation: a diverse cuisine (açaí, fish, duck in tucupi, tacacá), a living culture that mixes indigenous, black and European matrices, urban landscapes that take your breath away not only for the climate, but for the beauty, and a warm, generous and proud population to host COP30 in its territory. Pará is known for being the world’s largest producer of açaí, for being home to a large part of the Brazilian Amazon and for extending to Marajó Island, famous for buffaloes and Marajoara ceramics. The name ”Pará” comes from the Tupi-Guarani pa’ra, ”river-sea”, reminding us that here the boundaries between river and ocean, land and water, city and forest are always fluid. In this context, holding COP30 in Belém is not a detail: it is a political and symbolic choice, in which the forest itself is present every day, in the afternoon, with its torrential rains that often make speeches inaudible for a few minutes. To talk about climate, nature and anthropogenic changes is to talk about the Amazon, its peoples, and how close we are to its tipping point.

Views of the negotiations

The Indigenous Peoples Caucus and the Brazilian representation in Belém constitute a historic and diverse group within the Brazilian delegation. Their demands revolve around collective reflections that have the principle of the 7th generation (in which decisions must consider their impacts in up to 7 generations) as central and beyond:

• The recognition of indigenous territories as a climate solution;

•  direct funding for people and communities;

• the demarcation and effective protection of lands;

• full and effective participation in decision-making spaces;

• respect for their worldviews;

• more seats in official delegations;

• participation in the definition of agendas;

• power of voice and vote in decisions that directly affect their territories.

This group operates both within the Blue Zone and Green Zone and in alternative and self-managed spaces in the city, such as the so-called COP30 Village, People’s COP and People’s Summit, which welcome and articulate a large number of Indigenous Peoples, Quilombola and Traditional Communities, social movements and allies who do not have access to the official negotiation area. Despite the historic Indigenous presence, celebrated by the Minister of Indigenous Peoples, Sonia Guajajara, at the opening of the Brazilian Pavilion on November 10, the barriers to access remain evident.

The estimate is that about 3,000 indigenous representatives come from different parts of the world. Still, only about 14% (360 people) have accreditation for the Blue Zone, which also hosts an Indigenous Peoples Pavilion. This inequality of access reveals a central contradiction: the people who most protect the forest still have a limited presence in the spaces where their future is decided. Additionally, it is essential to note that the indigenous movement is not a homogeneous entity. In Brazil alone, there are about 400 ethnic groups, and the plurality of voices and positions was evident in the actions of the first week. On the second day of COP30, indigenous people and allies held a protest, in which they entered the Blue Zone, demanding greater representation and real participation in the negotiations. The Munduruku People staged another demonstration in front of the Blue Zone, demanding a meeting with President Lula to discuss the situation of their territories. After hours under the intense sun, leaders were received by COP30 President and Minister Sonia Guajajara (Indigenous Peoples) and Minister Marina Silva (Environment).

In a speech at the beginning of 2025, Marina Silva recalled that a COP ”is not a party, it is a struggle. It’s not the World Cup, it’s not the Olympics.” She described this moment as a ”pedagogy of mourning and pain”, marked by the threat to multilateralism, solidarity and collaboration between peoples. This pedagogy is also present in indigenous bodies and voices that, even in the face of fatigue, continue to demand demarcation and climate justice.

Perspectives from the ground

Wilses Tapajós, Indigenous doctor, Cobra Grande territory, within the territory called Brazil

”This is my first COP. I felt ’recognized’ by the public call, recognized in the sense of hearing: ’we want you at the COP, you can help’. I will stay for the two weeks, and I can say that I will leave COP30 differently, due to the amount of content about the climate crisis and because, through them, I find myself as a doctor in the relationship between climate and health. I always knew, from experience, that climate and health are closely linked, but I lacked a more solid foundation, data, and technical language; here I am finding them. As an indigenous person, however, the feeling is dubious. If managers, ministers, and presidents recognize that we, indigenous peoples, protect the forests, risking our lives to defend our territories, why are our lands not yet demarcated? My territory, Cobra Grande, is not large: we are about 500 indigenous people, 150 families, but the demarcation process is stopped at the stage of physical delimitation; at FUNAIthey told us that there are no resources to continue, and so we continue to be exposed to the fury of non-indigenous people, to invasion, to violence.

The more protected and demarcated indigenous territories are, the greater the chances are that our population will grow safely. At a time like COP30, we dream of a strong, clear recommendation for demarcation now, and that it really happens. More demarcated lands mean more people taking care of the forest, more standing forest, and more concrete contributions to addressing the climate crisis, in addition to being one of the steps towards our well-being, as we also fight for education, health, safety, and transportation.

The presence of many indigenous people at the COP brings hope that this debate can be qualified and that positive changes can be strengthened. I wonder how many of us will come out of this COP30 empowered, and how this can contribute to more dialogues, changes and the presence of more indigenous people in the management of this country. The climate crisis has shaken the world, something that we, Indigenous Peoples, have been announcing for a long time. But, in fact, COP30 brings hope, knowledge, empowerment and dreams. I am happy to participate in this global climate struggle because, in a way, it relates to our demands: to keep the forest standing, rivers alive, fauna and flora intact, and thus prevent the destruction of this planet.” 

Esther Martínez Ayuukh, Young Ayuujk, a member of the Ayuujk Poj Kaa Women’s Organization, a territory called Oaxaca, Mexico.

“The presence of sister nations at COP30 becomes a collective force that supports and shelters. However, repression, lack of access, and the fact that our voices are ignored or that we lack a seat at the negotiating tables foster rage and anger in both mind and body. Indigenous communities are met with disdain, restrictions, fences, weapons, and soldiers, just as they arrive in our territories. They strip us of our ways of life and destroy our Mother Earth, as well as our bodies. From birth, the capitalist, patriarchal, and colonialist system subjects us to violent and invasive health institutions; women are used as birth machines for their system, torn from our land. We want to be born with dignity in our land. Justice for women and their bodies is also climate justice, women are the first territory to be defended.

Because women, young people, and girls are guardians of seeds and knowledge, we communicate with the land, the hill, and the web of life to harvest food from the milpa. In these times, this has become an exhausting struggle, a struggle for survival, due to the drought of our soils, changes in precipitation patterns, pests, diseases, agrotoxics, transgenic seeds, and companies. They make the continuity of the milpa no longer viable; that is what they are seeking, to make us lose food sovereignty and become dependent on their unsustainable production systems.

Thanks to our grandmothers and grandfathers, we know that our land is the most valuable thing that exists; we will not abandon it. Instead, we adapt and evolve with it in response to climate change and the extractivist system. Every seed I care for and preserve is and will be food for my daughters and future generations, enabling them to continue evolving and living as Ayuujk people. We want them to stop perceiving us as objects and merchandise. It is unjust that we bear the responsibility of preserving our forests in exchange for our lives, when it is the extractivist system that destroys them. We seek justice and a dignified life for ourselves and our territories. We are the diversity of Mother Earth; the continuation of our lives depends on the web of life.”

This article was originally published by Focali here, you can also find the Portuguese version.

This article was co-written by:

Taís Sonetti González, latina and mestiça researcher, based in the Global South. Focali member E-mail: tatasgonzalez@gmail.com
& Post-doctoral reseracher at Unicamp – AmazonFACE, resercher associated with Stockholm Resilience Centre

Wilses Tapajós, Indigenous doctor, Cobra Grande territory, within the territory called Brazil. E-mail: assicog@gmail.com Instagram: acaosaudeindigena 

Esther Martínez Ayuujk, Young Ayuujk, a member of the Ayuujk Poj Kaa Women’s Organization, a territory called Oaxaca, Mexico. E-mail: pojkaaac@gmail.com
Instagram: poj_kaa_