Tribal communities will soon have access to $46m to tackle effects of the climate crisis, which disproportionately threaten Indigenous Americans’ food supplies, livelihoods and infrastructure.
The funds are part of a historic five-year investment plan under Joe Biden’s bipartisan infrastructure law, intended to improve climate resilience and adaptation in tribal territories.
Some communities will have to relocate because of rising sea levels and storm surges.
“As the effects of climate change continue to intensify, Indigenous communities are facing unique climate-related challenges that pose existential threats to tribal economies, infrastructure, lives and livelihoods,” said Deb Haaland, the secretary of the interior and America’s first Indigenous cabinet secretary.
“President Biden’s historic investments in tribal communities will help bolster community resilience, replace aging infrastructure and provide support needed for climate-related community-driven relocation and adaptation.”
Across the US, the climate crisis, caused by unchecked greenhouse gas emissions, poses particular threats to Indigenous culture and livelihoods closely tied to local ecosystems.
Of the 574 federally recognized tribes in the US, 40% live in Alaska Native communities, where rapidly rising temperatures, melting sea ice and glaciers, and thawing permafrost are causing significant problems for critical infrastructure such as roads, bridges and housing.
Alaska Natives are among America’s first climate refugees, with almost 90% of villages susceptible to flooding and erosion.
In the south-west, inland communities including the Navajo and Tohono O’odham nations face worsening drought and extreme heat.
Indigenous people across the world have contributed almost nothing to greenhouse gas emissions that cause global heating, having once thrived through ecologically sustainable agriculture, fishing and hunting traditions.
Yet traditional medicines, foods such as fish and game, and wild and cultivated crops are now in decline, Access is often further limited by reservation boundaries.
By the end of the century, more than half of US salmon and trout habitats are expected to be lost. Many tribes have relied on such fish for food, cultural practices and economic development.
Biden’s infrastructure law provides $466m to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, including $216m for climate resilience programs. Of that funding, $130m is provided for community relocation, $86m is provided for climate resilience and adaptation projects, and $43.2m will be available to spend annually for five years.
Tribes can submit proposals to the Department of the Interior for a share of the first installment of new funding, which promises to recognise tribal ecological knowledge and traditional sustainable practices, and to support community-driven rather than imposed relocation.
While the money has been welcomed, it is nowhere near enough, or supplied fast enough, to combat the effects of extreme heat, rising sea level, flooding and other climate phenomena which are already causing chaos.
