● Indigenous thinking about nature-based solutions and climate justice
Transformative urban and architectural design values for wellbeing and adaptation in New Caledonia – Fieldwork report July 2023
2023. By Maibritt Pedersen Zari and Amanda Yates
Extract: Associate Maibritt Pedersen Zari (NUWAO) and Associate Professor Amanda Yates (Building Better Homes, Towns and Cities (BBHTC) Urban Wellbeing programme) of AUT’s School of Future Environments visited and held workshops in several Kanak communities in both urban and semi-urban settings in New Caledonia from the 8th to the 19th of July 2023 to understand:
● Indigenous perspectives on relationships between people, land, ocean and the living world;
● what underpins Kanak wellbeing in relation to the built environment; and
● how these concepts do or could feed into transformative change.
They also talked to social housing workers and youth workers.
The research was in collaboration with the New Caledonian Government’s Construction Department and a larger ‘Oceanian Habitat’ project resourced by the Pacific Fund (FP).

Nouméa, New Caledonia.
Indigenous thinking about nature-based solutions and climate justice
2022. By: Mercia Abbott, Tokintekai Bakineti, Lyn Carter, Anita Latai-Niusulu, Willy Missack, Ihaia Puketapu and Rebecca Kiddle
For: The British Academy. Online
Extract: Indigenous peoples, as 5% of the world’s total population, protect over 80% of the world’s biodiversity. Underpinning an Indigenous approach to nature-based solutions is the commitment to climate justice. Climate justice is founded on the truth that power and privilege cut across climate policy and climate law. Climate causes, consequences and remedies must be informed by analysis of power and intersectional identities. Climate justice recognises and seeks to empower Indigenous knowledge.

Tarawa, Kiribati