Protecting the world’s remaining rainforests has never been more important. When Indigenous peoples’ rights are recognized, the rainforests in their ancestral territories remain standing.

In 2023, you rose up, joining Indigenous peoples to challenge the major drivers of Amazon destruction and defend land, water, and life in Earth’s largest rainforest. So, what’s in store in 2024 to keep turning the tide for the Amazon?

Global pressure builds to get mining out of the Amazon

Despite widespread resistance, Canadian mining company Belo Sun continues trying to build what would be Brazil’s largest open-pit gold mine right in the heart of the Amazon. Alongside Indigenous partners, we’re educating investors, carrying out actions at key mining industry events, coalition-building with Amazonian peoples and Canadian First Nations, and building public pressure to get Belo Sun out of the Amazon for good. Some signs of progress: Brazilian federal prosecutors are suing to annul its dubious contract; Belo Sun filed a desperate retaliatory lawsuit unjustly targeting community leaders, environmental defenders, researchers, and Amazon Watch staff; and, Belo Sun’s stock tanked over the course of these actions, showing that our campaign to get #MiningOutoftheAmazon is stronger than ever.

The shift away from fossil fuels is underway

The campaign to End Amazon Crude is gaining steam. We’ve published risk alerts about oil companies and accompanied Indigenous partners to international events to expose the devastating effects of oil drilling in their territories. A group of European banks cut off funding for Amazon oil as a result, and investors aren’t the only ones taking note. Ecuadorians overwhelmingly voted to halt a major oil project in Yasuní, Indigenous territory and one of the most biodiverse places on Earth. People in California, the #1 consumer of Ecuadorian crude, stood up to Big Oil and forced a rollback on drilling in the state. Each victory is connected. We’re working with Indigenous peoples and allies in CA to build on these successes and #EndAmazonCrude once and for all!

Resistance to Marco Temporal builds global commitment to Indigenous rights

For more than a decade, Brazil’s agribusiness industry has tried to roll back Indigenous rights and open territories to destruction using a sham legal thesis known as "Marco Temporal." In one of the most significant victories this century for Brazil’s Indigenous movement, the Supreme Court struck down the legislation in fall 2023, followed by a presidential veto of a second, very similar bill. After Congress voted to override this veto, the pressure remains to permanently shut down this anti-Indigenous, anti-environmental pretext for land theft. In the face of these extreme legal attempts, global support for Brazil’s Indigenous movement has grown. Their demands to have their rights recognized and territories protected are being heard more powerfully than ever.

Even as threats to the rainforest persist, these tidal changes show us how much – and how strong – this global community has grown. Indigenous peoples have the solutions for their ancestral homelands. Now is the moment for us to come together to get Mining Out of the Amazon, End Amazon Crude, and recognize Indigenous rights and stewardship for good!

For the Amazon and Mother Earth,

Leila Salazar-López
Executive Director

P.S. I’m so inspired by how Indigenous peoples and their allies like you are rising up in the face of mining, fossil fuel, and agribusiness pressures seeking to destroy the Amazon. Thank you for your support!