From Ancestral Territories to Spatial Technologies: Co-producing Climate Solutions with Indigenous Communities in the Amazon

This research examines the increasing vulnerability of Indigenous territories in the Brazilian Amazon to climate change, with particular emphasis on water scarcity, food insecurity and ecosystem degradation, while critically addressing the continued marginalisation of Indigenous knowledge within dominant
climate governance frameworks. The project seeks to co-produce climate knowledge with Indigenous communities, exploring how ancestral territorial wisdom can inform more just, effective and place-based climate adaptation and mitigation strategies, grounded in the understanding that Indigenous-led knowledge production generates socially legitimate and environmentally responsive solutions. Employing a participatory and transdisciplinary approach, the research is based on in-depth field immersion with Indigenous communities in the Amazon Rainforest and integrates participatory mapping, GIS-based StoryMaps, large-scale 3D physical territorial modelling, qualitative interviews, collaborative workshops and visual methodologies. Throughout all stages of the project, Indigenous leaders act as co-researchers, shaping research questions, guiding methodological choices and validating outcomes. The findings demonstrate that Indigenous territorial ontologies offer sophisticated interpretations of climate dynamics, risk prevention and natural resource management that challenge technocratic, externally imposed climate models. These perspectives reveal locally grounded strategies for water governance,
food resilience and biodiversity protection that are deeply embedded in long-term relationships with territory and ecology. The project’s originality lies in repositioning Indigenous communities as epistemic leaders rather than passive data providers and in its innovative integration of GIS-based spatial technologies with ancestral knowledge systems. By bridging Indigenous epistemologies and spatial analysis tools, the research delivers methodological advances with significant implications for climate research, policy design, education and inclusive, ethical global climate governance.