Gómez-Baggethun, E., E. Corbera, and V. Reyes-García. 2013. Traditional ecological knowledge and global environmental change: research findings and policy implications. Ecology and Society 18(4): 72. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-06288-180472

Indigenous Peoples and local communities (IPLC) are affected by global environmental change because they directly rely on their immediate environment for meeting basic livelihood needs. Therefore, safeguarding and restoring ecosystem resilience is critical to support their well‐being. Based on examples from the literature, we illustrate how IPLC participate in restoration activities maintaining traditional practices, restoring land degraded by outsiders, and joining outside groups seeking to restore ecosystems. Our review also provides examples of how Indigenous and Local Knowledge can be incorporated in the planning, execution, and monitoring of restoration activities. However, not all restoration initiatives engaging IPLC are beneficial or successful, and the factors that lead to success are not fully known. While local involvement in restoration projects is often mentioned as an element of success, this is primarily associated to projects that actively involve IPLC in codesigning restoration activities affecting their territories, ensure both short‐term direct benefits to IPLC and long‐term support of the maintenance of restored areas, and recognize IPLC local traditions and customary institutions. Based on these examples, we argue that IPLC should be a more important focus in any post‐2020 CBD agenda on restoration.

Assessing the effects of markets on the well-being of indigenous peoples and their conservation of natural resources matters to identify public policies to improve well-being and enhance conservation and to test hypotheses about sociocultural change. We review studies about how market economies affect the subsistence, health, nutritional status, social capital, and traditional ecological knowledge of indigenous peoples and their use of renewable natural resources. Market exposure produces mixed effects on well-being and conservation. Unclear effects arise from the small sample size of observations; reliance on cross-sectional data or short panels; lack of agreement on the measure of key variables, such as integration to the market or folk knowledge, or whether to rely on perceived or objective indicators of health; and endogeneity biases. Rigorous empirical studies linking market economies with the well-being of indigenous peoples or their use of renewable natural resources have yet to take off.