Ni Toh Kakuhu - Water Is Life: Climate Justice for Borikén

The United Confederation of Taíno People (UCTP) expresses its deep concern regarding the escalating drought and water crisis affecting Borikén (Puerto Rico). Declining rainfall, falling reservoir and groundwater levels, stressed rivers and ecosystems, and water rationing affecting communities across the island are not isolated events. They are warnings of the increasing vulnerability of Caribbean islands to drought, land degradation, extreme heat, and the broader impacts of the climate crisis.

For Taíno Peoples, water is not simply a commodity or public utility. Water is life. Our rivers, wetlands, springs, forests, coastal ecosystems, and watersheds are interconnected living systems that have sustained our Peoples since time immemorial. Protecting these systems is therefore inseparable from protecting our communities, our food systems, our cultural heritage, and the generations yet to come.

The current crisis also raises fundamental questions of climate justice. Caribbean Peoples have contributed disproportionately little to the global emissions driving climate change, yet our islands are among the places experiencing its consequences most directly. Drought, stronger heat, changing rainfall patterns, coastal impacts, food insecurity, and pressure on freshwater resources increasingly threaten the well-being and resilience of our communities. Those who have contributed least to the climate crisis must not be left to bear its greatest burdens.

These realities are particularly significant as governments, Indigenous Peoples, and other participants gather in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, for the 17th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD COP17) under the theme “Restoring Land. Restoring Hope.” The discussions taking place at COP17 concerning drought resilience, land degradation, restoration, food and water security cannot be viewed as distant global policy debates. What is happening today in Borikén demonstrates precisely why these discussions matter.

The current crisis also reinforces concerns UCTP has previously raised, including before the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, regarding how major development decisions are being made across Borikén. Large-scale projects such as the proposed Proyecto Esencia in Cabo Rojo, particularly those requiring substantial groundwater resources and extensive alteration of land, cannot be considered separately from the island's changing climate and increasingly fragile water systems. Even where developers propose independent water infrastructure, the extraction of groundwater and transformation of watersheds remain part of interconnected ecological systems. UCTP therefore calls for transparent, independent, science-based and cumulative assessments of the long-term impacts of major developments on aquifers, watersheds, wetlands, biodiversity, surrounding communities, and future water availability. Climate justice requires that development decisions respect the ecological limits of our island and safeguard water as a shared source of life for present and future generations.

The UCTP calls for a comprehensive response to the water crisis that goes beyond emergency rationing. Governments and institutions must invest in watershed restoration and protection, resilient water infrastructure, sustainable land management, agroecology and local food production, reforestation, and community-based climate adaptation. Indigenous Peoples and our traditional knowledge must be included as rights-holders and decision-makers in developing and implementing these responses.

Through our advocacy for climate justice, our participation in international environmental processes, and our land-based initiatives in Borikén, the UCTP continues to affirm that restoring healthy relationships between Peoples, lands, and waters is essential to building genuine climate resilience. Our own Taíno Konuko Project seeks to contribute to this work by revitalizing Indigenous agroecological knowledge, strengthening local food sovereignty, restoring soils and biodiversity, and demonstrating approaches to caring for the land that have sustained Caribbean Indigenous Peoples for generations.

The water crisis confronting Borikén should serve as a call to action. Climate adaptation cannot wait until reservoirs are empty, crops are lost, or communities are left without reliable access to water. Governments must act now while ensuring that the rights, knowledge, and participation of Indigenous Peoples are respected.

As the international community discusses restoring degraded lands and strengthening drought resilience at UNCCD COP17, we call upon decision-makers to remember that land, water, climate, biodiversity, food, and human rights are inseparable.

For Borikén, for the Caribbean, and for Atabeira (Mother Earth), the time for climate justice is now.

Ni Toh Kakuhu - Water is life. Land is life. Our future depends upon protecting both.