Guyana’s Amerindian Peoples Association at the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues: “We were not properly consulted on how our forests and lands would be used”
The Petrostate of Guyana does not respect the right to free, prior and informed consent.
Last week saw the start of the 24th Session of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues at the UN Headquarters in New York. The meeting runs from 21 April to 2 May 2025, and the theme of the meeting is “Implementing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples within United Nations Member States and the United Nations system, including identifying good practices and addressing challenges.”
Guyana’s Amerindian Peoples Association (APA) is taking part in the meeting. In a media statement, APA explained that,
The APA’s participation in the 24th UNPFII is part of its ongoing mission to promote and defend the rights of Indigenous Peoples across Guyana. Over the years, the APA has consistently worked to bring attention to issues such as land tenure rights, Indigenous governance, and upholding free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) principles.
On 23 April 2025, Mario Hastings, the President of the APA, gave a short speech at the Permanent Forum meeting.
Hastings criticised the Government of Guyana for failing to respect Indigenous Peoples’ ownership of their ancestral lands. He pointed out that the principle of free, prior and informed consent is not legally protected in Guyana.
He highlights how carbon credits are being generated from Indigenous Peoples’ lands and forests, but adds that “The processes arriving to arriving at this agreement were deeply flawed.”
Hastings calls for Guyana’s 2006 Amerindian Act to be revised, in order to incorporate the standards in the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
ExxonMobil’s petrostate
In 2015, ExxonMobil announced a massive oil discovery off the coast of Guyana. An ExxonMobil subsidiary, Esso Exploration and Production Guyana, is leading the consortium to extract the oil, along with the Hess Corporation, and China’s CNOOC.
A recent investigation by InfoAmazonia revealed that the Government of Guyana “eased environmental regulations, signed contracts that benefited oil companies at the expense of the public, and backed the corporations in legal disputes, heralding its emergence as a ‘petrostate’”.
While the country’s Gross Domestic Product growth rate has soared, the rate of unemployment has remained high — at 14% it’s one of the highest in Latin America. Construction projects are build by Chinese companies with mainly Asian workers.
The 2017 environmental license for Esso’s first discovered reserve, the Liza Phase 1 field, prohibits gas flaring except during maintenance or emergencies. Yet there were 1,298 instances of gas flaring between 2019 and 2023. Esso flared 687 million cubic metres of gas off Guyana’s coast, emitted 1.32 million tons of carbon dioxide.
Oil extraction has disrupted fishing. The heavy ship traffic and vibrations from offshore operations drive away the fish.
In addition to the offshore operations, onshore oil exploration blocks overlap with 13 Indigenous territories and one nature reserve.
In 2022, Guyana signed a deal with the Hess Corporation for 37.5 million carbon credits over 10 years. The US$750 million carbon deal covers almost all the country’s forests, including Indigenous Peoples’ territories.
Indigenous Peoples were not properly informed about the carbon deal and in March 2023 the Amerindian Peoples Association filed a complaint against Architecture for REDD+ Transactions — the organisation that certified the carbon credits.
But by October 2023, the complaint process had collapsed and APA was forced to withdraw its appeal.
APA’s Mario Hastings told InfoAmazonia that,
“We are now finding out that our forests may be ‘sold’ to the very companies most responsible for climate issues – the oil companies. However, we Indigenous people remain unaware of what was signed or agreed upon, as there was no proper consultation.”
“We were not properly consulted on how our forests and lands would be used in this scheme”
Hastings’ speech at the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues is posted here in full.
Greetings all and thank you Madam Chair. In Guyana, Indigenous Peoples, despite having titles to our lands, have no ownership over the resources from them, nor are we consulted when these resources want to be exploited by companies or our government.
We, the Amerindian Peoples Association, have been calling for our government to reform our laws, and practices to enshrine the human rights standards of the UNDRIP that our country has already adopted. However, our peoples’ right to free, prior, and informed consent are still not respected, nor required in our laws.
Government actions directly violate our collective rights to self-determination and our land. Therefore, stronger incorporation of the UNDRIP would increase the protections of our rights and ensure that they are respected and upheld, rather than overridden by corporate or state interests.
Our government speaks glowingly about Indigenous communities benefiting from funding from the Low Carbon Development Strategy through the sale of carbon credits. However, this is not the full picture. The processes arriving at this agreement were deeply flawed.
Again, we were not properly consulted on how our forests and lands would be used in this scheme. We were not allowed to consent to this programme with the mandate of our people. And, we were not part of any negotiations to determine how our peoples could have benefited from the national initiative according to our needs prior to the carbon sales agreement.
Our sacred lands that have been handed down through generations with care and reverence are being stripped, our rivers are being poisoned, and our environment is being desecrated in the name of extractive industries and profit.
Chair, we are witnessing the reckless seizure of our lands and resources without a seat at the decision-making table to avoid the devastation that such actions can cause. All this is justified in the name of economic development, without our participation, while fostering division among our peoples.
We call on the Government of Guyana to take tangible steps toward the revision of the 2006 Amerindian Act, and incorporate the articles of the UNDRIP into our national laws to ensure the protection of our peoples in the fact of growing threats from the old and new extractive industries.
We ask that the government takes on the recommendations made by Guyana’s Villages and District Councils for amendments to the Act in the national revision process.
We also ask that the Permanent Forum monitor the government’s process to ensure that Guyana’s Indigenous Peoples are part of the national exercise that will determine the future of our rights, culture, and lives.
Thank you.
Naturally, in business thought (entries on balance sheets), in the government’s blind drive to become a petrostate, all regulation, natural areas, peoples, employment and safety, are impediments to “Progress.” As well, nobody needs that oil and here’s an excellent opportunity to leave it in the ground.