Brazil: Ban Wildlife Works from the Ka’apor Rainforest

Co-sign before Jul 15, 2025

To: Minister of Indigenous Peoples, Sonia Guajajara; President of FUNAI, Joenia Wapichana; Coordinator of the 6th Chamber of the Attorney General's Office - Indigenous Peoples and traditional communities

Ladies and Gentlemen,

For two years, the leaders of the Tuxa Ta Pame Council of the Indigenous Ka'apor people have been complaining to the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office (MPF) and FUNAI about rights violations on their territory in Maranhão by the US company Wildlife Works. According to the lawsuits, the company wants to carry out a project to generate carbon credits on the Indigenous land of Alto Turiaçu in the Amazon region in violation of national and international laws.

In January 2024, the Ka'apor Indigenous Council officially informed the company in a letter that it did not accept the presence of foreign persons in connection with the carbon credit project on their land and demanded the immediate withdrawal and cessation of all activities.

Wildlife Works has not obtained free, prior and informed consent for the project from the Ka'apor, as required by Convention 169 of the UN's International Labor Organization (ILO), which Brazil has ratified.

Despite all of this, the company continues to hold meetings and gatherings in various villages in the area and disregards the decisions of the Indigenous leaders. Wildlife Works' activities and promises also lead to conflict among the Ka'apor, making the area, which has suffered for decades from encroachment by loggers, poachers and ranchers, even more vulnerable.

Wildlife Works began encroaching on the Indigenous land of the Ka'apor when the company was not even registered in Brazil - which is illegal.

In light of the deteriorating situation, in October 2024, the Ka'apor Indigenous Council filed a lawsuit in Federal Court against Wildlife Works, the Indigenous authority Funai and the federal government. It called for a halt to any and all of the company’s activities in Alto Turiaçu and for the federal government and Funai to carry out inspection and control actions in the Ka'apor territory, preventing the entry of national and/or foreign companies that promote carbon credit trading, especially as there are no standards for this in Brazil.

We ask Your Excellencies to take urgent measures to prevent the company from entering Indigenous land and continuing to violate the rights of the Ka'apor people in their own territory.

Yours faithfully,

Co-signed by

• Rettet den Regenwald e.V., Germany