Peter Veit

Director, Land and Resource Rights Initiative

Bio

Peter is Director of the Land and Resource Rights (LRR) initiative. LRR seeks to strengthen land tenure and natural resource rights of rural people and communities by: 1) conducting research and generating new knowledge on critical property rights issues; 2) developing information platforms, including an online platform to document community rights; 3) participating in and contributing to policy and legislative reform processes; and 4) building the capacity of civil society organizations and other actors. Peter is also an Adjunct Professor at the School of International Advanced Studies, Johns Hopkins University.

For more than 25 years, Peter has worked on a range of environmental governance matters, particularly environment/democracy and environment/human rights links. He has conducted research and written on community-based natural resource management, environmental decentralization, environmental advocacy, and other environmental accountability matters. Peter has undertaken long-term field research in a number of African countries, including in Sierra Leone as a Fulbright Scholar, where he conducted research on household variability in agricultural strategies and practices; and, in Rwanda as Director of the Karisoke Mountain Gorilla Research Center, where in the 1970s he studied the behavior of mountain gorillas. Peter has also held a range of research and teaching positions at the University of California campuses at Santa Cruz and Davis.

Blogs

4 Ways Indigenous and Community Lands Can Reduce Emissions
by Peter Veit - March 25, 2021
As countries submit new climate plans this year, they should consider the emissions-reduction benefits of stronger community land rights.
Mining Threatens 20% of Indigenous Lands in the Amazon
by Patricia Quijano Vallejos and Peter Veit - October 07, 2020
New WRI research shows that legal large-scale mining concessions and illegal mining areas overlap with more than 20% of Indigenous land in the Amazon.
La Minería Legal e Ilegal Amenazan el 20% de las Tierras Indígenas en la Amazonía
by Patricia Quijano Vallejos and Peter Veit - October 07, 2020
Una nueva investigación de WRI muestra que las concesiones mineras legales a gran escala y las áreas mineras ilegales se superponen con más del 20% de la tierra indígena en la Amazonía.
COVID-19, Rising Gold Prices and Illegal Mining Threaten Indigenous Lands in the Amazon
by Peter Veit and Patricia Quijano Vallejos - September 08, 2020
As the price of gold and other minerals soars, expanded mining in Amazonian countries has damaging impacts on the forest and its people, including the 1.5 million Indigenous People who depend on the Amazon for their livelihoods and well-being.
The IPCC Calls for Securing Community Land Rights to Fight Climate Change
by Hannah Mowat and Peter Veit - August 08, 2019
Indigenous peoples and other local communities have long argued that they play a central role in safeguarding more than half the world’s land, including much of its forests. The world’s leading climate scientists now agree.
Peru’s Indigenous Communities Manage Their Forests. Others Should Follow Their Lead
by Peter Veit, Marlena Chertock and Katelyn Bredsnajder - January 23, 2019
Peruvian indigenous communities have shown themselves to be exceptional environmental and conservation leaders. Their leaders have worked for a decade to ensure a government commitment to conserve 54 million hectares of forest, as a part of the REDD+ program.
Safeguarding the Carbon Stored in Indigenous and Community Lands is Essential to Meeting Climate Goals
by Katie Reytar, Marlena Chertock and Peter Veit - September 13, 2018
Scientists estimate that by managing the world's land more sustainably, such as by protecting forests and investing in reforestation, we could achieve up to 37 percent of emissions reductions necessary to limit the global rise in temperature to 2 degrees Celsius by 2030.
Mientras los grupos indígenas esperan durante décadas para los títulos de tierras, las empresas están adquiriendo sus territorios
by Laura Notess and Peter Veit - July 11, 2018
Las comunidad de Santa Clara Uchunya lleva varias generaciones viviendo en una zona remota del Amazonas peruano. Al igual que muchos grupos indígenas, esta comunidad del pueblo Shipibo-Konibo ha gestionado y dependido tradicionalmente de sus bosques para la caza, la...
As Indigenous Groups Wait Decades for Land Titles, Companies Are Acquiring Their Territories
by Laura Notess and Peter Veit - July 11, 2018
The Santa Clara de Uchunya community has lived in a remote section of the Peruvian Amazon for generations, relying on the forest for hunting, fishing and natural resources. But in 2014, someone started cutting down large sections of their ancestral lands. They've been struggling for their land rights ever since.
5 Ways Indigenous Groups Are Fighting Back Against Land Seizures
by Peter Veit - June 20, 2018
Eager to extract natural resources, governments and corporations are increasingly snatching land from indigenous groups. But these communities aren't standing by idly—they're mapping territory borders, protesting and even litigating to protect their land and resources.

Commentaries

Land Matters: How Securing Community Land Rights Can Slow Climate Change and Accelerate the Sustainable Development Goals

January 24, 2019

There is a strong and compelling environment and development case to be made for securing indigenous and community lands. Securing collective land rights offers a low-cost, high-reward investment for developing country governments and their partners to meet national development objectives and the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Securing community lands is also a cost-effective climate mitigation measure for countries when compared to other carbon capture and storage approaches.

External Publications

"Community land formalization and company land acquisition procedures: A review of 33 procedures in 15 countries."
By Notess Laura, Veit Peter, Monterroso Iliana, , Sulle Emmanuel, Larson Anne M., Gindroz Anne-Sophie, Quaedvlieg Julia, Williams Andrew.
Land governance and tenure security at scale 110 (2021): 104461 DOI: 10.1016/j.landusepol.2020.104461.

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