Evolving nature-based solutions for Australia’s Indigenous estate in 2024 – opportunities and challenges

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Globally, there is growing interest and potential for investment in Nature-based Solutions (NbS) to protect, manage or restore ecosystems through incentive schemes including Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES), Nature Repair, Carbon Markets, Common Asset Trusts. Collectively, these NbS markets establish interchangeable mechanisms to help address biodiversity and climate crises, as well as socio-economic issues concerning many Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (IPLCs). IPLCs manage and/or own almost 32% of the world’s land area through customary and community-based tenure arrangements. Since 2000 several PES schemes have been implemented in Australia. These schemes have been overwhelmingly implemented as public-good expenditure, with governments providing ~90% of total funding. Indigenous people have either the legal right to run or veto a carbon market or nature repair project over 57% of the Australian land mass, increasing to 63% in savanna and 85% in desert regions. Here we critically assess opportunities and challenges for Australia’s Indigenous estate associated with existing and emerging NbS market approaches, especially the Commonwealth’s current Savanna Fire Management (SFM) and Human Induced Regeneration methods, evolving Integrated Farm & Land Management (IFLM) and Blue Carbon methods, and proposed Nature Repair (NR) market. To date, Indigenous NbS interests have focused especially on SFM across northern Australia, with prospective opportunities especially for IFLM and NR markets. Most available schemes focus on remediation of degraded lands and seas, ignoring cost-effective investment opportunities to maintain habitats and ecosystems in less-degraded condition. Government-supported Common Asset Trusts can provide effective models for governance of stewardship schemes relevant to on-going care for relatively intact ecosystems. In Discussion we summarise key methodological, institutional, and policy opportunities and challenges for constructive Indigenous engagement with developing NbS markets. Our purpose is to provide an Indigenous land and sea management context to inform development of rapidly evolving NbS markets in Australia.