By Juliana Castro Escobar
As the world turns its eyes toward Belém for COP30, during March 2025, the president of COP30, André Corrêa do Lago, in his letter to the public, invited the international community to join Brazil in a Global Mutirão against climate change. More than a concept, the invitation represents a different way of working together, one that echoes an indigenous tradition: the Mutirão. It is both a form of collective action and a potential way of reframing climate multilateralism as inclusive, participatory, and grounded in frontline realities.
What is a mutirão?
In Brazil, a mutirão refers to a community-led mobilisation where people come together to accomplish a shared goal. For example, building a house, restoring land, or planting crops. The tradition is rooted in Indigenous practices across South America, from the Amazon where it is known as puxirum, to the Andes where it is called minka or minga.
The mutirão is a self-organised mobilisation grounded in collective care, shared purpose, solidarity, and mutual support. In Indigenous contexts, it transcends the practical and reflects an ethical and relational worldview, where horizontal collaboration contrasts hierarchical approaches, and community well-being and ecological balance are inseparable.
Brazil’s call for a global Mutirão seeks to elevate this spirit of collective action to the global stage to coordinate thousands of on-the-ground climate solutions and connect them to the UN climate agenda. It recognises that while climate change is a global challenge, powerful solutions often begin locally.
What is the proposal?
Rather than limiting climate action to negotiations among national governments, this approach envisions local governments, indigenous peoples, social movements, youth, and civil society organisations as co-creators of climate solutions. The aim is not to replace formal UNFCCC processes, but to link them more effectively with local action, connecting territorial efforts with finance, data, and policy pathways.
For this, Brazil is convening regional dialogues under a Global Ethical Stocktake banner designed to bring society’s voice into the official COP30 process and shape key initiatives in Belém. Additionally, the Presidency launched mutirão’s new digital platform to connect and make local initiatives tackling the climate crisis more visible.
A shared governance model has also been created, featuring Special Envoys, the Presidency Youth Climate Champion, and the Circle of Peoples to ensure COP30 reflects the realities of those most affected by climate change. For practitioners, joining the Mutirão movement means arriving in Belém with bottom-up, inclusive proposals ready to integrate into national plans and turn pilot projects into policy and action.
By the end of COP30, a successful global mutirão could mean:
- Clear, ambitious and actionable NDCs.
- Finance pathways that connect with local initiatives.
- Champions and envoys named across sectors and geographies, with concrete mandates.
- COP decisions referencing the mutirão and detailing how it supports global targets.
- Agreed standards and safeguards for human rights, gender, inclusion and mechanisms for community consent and benefit-sharing.
The Amazon as the heart of the mutirão
Nowhere is this paradigm more urgent than in the Amazon. The biome is far more than ‘a carbon sink’. It is home to over 500 Indigenous communities (including 188 in isolation) who hold ancestral knowledge that has sustained the largest rainforest on Earth. Furthermore, indigenous territories within the Amazon experience significantly lower deforestation rates than other areas.
The seeds of the mutirão approach were visible at the recent COP for Biodiversity (COP16) in Cali, Colombia, where dialogues were increasingly centered on territorial governance, Indigenous knowledge systems, and community-led conservation. Historic outcomes from Cali paved the way for COP30, including the creation of a permanent space for Indigenous Peoples and local communities(IPLCs), the recognition of the fundamental role of afro-descendant peoples in protecting biodiversity, and the recognition of ancestral knowledge and territorial visions as vital for tackling the biodiversity and climate crisis. This opened space for a Latin American vision rooted in biocultural diversity and territorial rights, offering a counterpoint to top-down global processes. The Global Mutirão builds on that momentum.
For Amazonian indigenous peoples, territories are “living spaces where nature, spirituality, science, and community go hand in hand”. Their message is clear: “There is no possible future without indigenous peoples at the center of global decisions”
Indigenous priorities for COP30 include:
- Direct access to climate finance.
- Integration of traditional knowledge into global climate solutions.
- Protection of environmental defenders.
- Representation in UNFCCC processes.
- Recognition of Indigenous territories as critical to both mitigation and adaptation.
As the Presidency’s vision for successful outcomes of the Belém package spans adaptation, mitigation, just transition, gender, and forests; aligning with Indigenous priorities is fundamental.
Our work with IPLCs in climate finance
At E Co, we’ve long believed that climate finance must reach the communities who safeguard the planet’s ecosystems and that IPLCs must be recognised not only as beneficiaries of climate projects, but as key partners in planning and implementing sustainable and impactful projects.
Our work includes the design of participatory consultation workshops and Free, Prior, and Informed Consent Processes (FPIC) with IPLCs worldwide. By supporting participatory approaches to projects, we help clients design and scale projects that align with local realities and IPLC priorities. By strengthening access to funds like the Green Climate Fund (GCF), Adaptation Fund, we help bridge the gap between global climate finance frameworks and territorial realities. This work is, in essence, a form of Mutirão, building trust, capability, and shared ownership.
Looking ahead: challenges and opportunities
Therefore, the Global Mutirão call resonates strongly with E Co’s mission. If adopted globally, this model could catalyse a new era of territorially driven climate governance able to ensure that climate finance truly serves those on the frontlines of change.
Yet important questions will have to be solved at Belém:
- How will this process remain participatory while accelerating the pace of action to reach global targets on time?
- How will equitable representation among geographies and local initiatives be ensured? How will it be integrated within global climate governance?
- How can coordination between local and global levels be sustained beyond COP30?
We invite you to explore E Co’s full range of technical advisory and climate finance consultancy services to ensure your projects and policies are inclusive and participatory. Furthermore, our Consultant Felipe Arenas and Principal consultant Riccardo Magini will be attending COP30. Do not hesitate to reach out to them and let’s build the collaborative networks necessary for a sustainably transformed world.
