Indigenous groups in India and Tanzania decry carbon projects that evict them from ancestral lands

JA Shivu, a young leader of the Jenu Kuruba people in southern India, explains that the establishment of Nagarahole National Park in 1983 and its later upgrade to a tiger reserve expelled more than 3,000 families and, according to her, about 20,000 tribe members have been barred from returning. In May 2025, she led over 50 families back to their former village inside the reserve, invoking the Forest Rights Act of 2006, but the forest department still calls them “invaders.”

Across the Indian Ocean, Maasai chief Mirihai Ngilepoi reports that the Longido and Monduli Rangeland Carbon Project, backed by Soils For The Future Tanzania, CarbonSolve LLC and Volkswagen, transferred 970,000 hectares of grazing land to a carbon-credit scheme, imposing a 14-day grazing rotation and banning other uses without Free, Prior and Informed Consent. The community withdrew from the agreement, and in April 2026 the company accepted the termination for Eluai, though the project persists in other villages.

Both Indigenous groups participated in a Survival International gathering in Nairobi, issuing a joint statement condemning carbon trading, biodiversity credits and “fortress conservation.” Their protests underscore growing resistance to market-based environmental initiatives that limit traditional land use.