Tribes prepare for impacts of climate change

Terri Hansen in Indian Country Today (US): "Let’s clear up some misconceptions about global climate change,” Lara Whitely Binder, of the Climate Impacts Group, told tribal representatives gathered at a climate change adaptation training course. … Earth’s climate is changing as a result of human practices – that fact is no longer in dispute. “We are not going to avoid the impacts,” emphasized Binder.

It will impact – and in some areas already is – the ecosystems of tribal communities who have relied on the bounty of land and sea for centuries to sustain them. Their forests, rangelands, oceans, freshwater, agriculture, weather; even life itself.

Binder’s remarks kicked off the May 18 – 20 event at the Quinault Beach Resort in Ocean Shores, Wash., sponsored by the Institute for Tribal Environmental Professionals at Northern Arizona University in cooperation with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Established in 1992, ITEP assists Indian tribes in management of their environmental resources through training and education.

Eighteen tribal representatives from Alaska, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, California and Maine were there to learn the how and why, and goals of adapting to climate change and ways to develop more climate resilient organizations, communities, economies and ecosystems….

An Ansel Adams photograph of "Canyon de Chelly," vertical panorama from river valley