This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: A pilot project in which Indigenous people in the Peruvian Amazon were given an unconditional basic income significantly improved community well-being, strengthened food security and supported rainforest protection, according to analysis by the University of Bath released today. Managed by the climate charity Cool Earth, the pilot project is the first of its kind to provide Amazonian Indigenous people with a basic income and offers new evidence that direct cash support can benefit both people and the planet.
During the two-year pilot, 211 people in three communities in Peru's Asháninka region were given a basic income in the form of cash transfers of 1,032 soles—equivalent to £2 a day—to spend as they liked. Using a "Cash Plus" model, the pilot also delivered a complementary program of community-led training, covering financial education, Indigenous rights and governance, environmental conservation and climate change. Analysis of the pilot by researchers from UBI Bath, the University of Bath's Universal Basic Income Research Group, examined changes and outcomes across areas including income generation, livelihoods, community cohesion, education, food security and nutrition, and environmental stewardship.
Neil Howard, UBI Bath lead and reader in Bath's Department of Social & Policy Sciences, said, "Giving historically marginalized Indigenous people a no-strings basic income brings a multitude of benefits both to their communities and their environment. "Cash makes a massive and immediate difference to people's lives, whether it's reducing outward migration for work, reducing poverty or enabling future planning and investments. The 'Plus' element of this project, providing help to communities to organize, also leads to better farming techniques and skills, better land use, richer community life and better relationships.
"All of this helps ethical conservation. The incentive to exploit or abandon land is diminished, and people are put front and center with respect and dignity, which contrasts sharply with the colonial history of conservation and Indigenous policy." Cool Earth co-developed the basic income pilot with two all-female Indigenous-led organizations: the National Organisation of Indigenous Andean and Amazonian Women of Peru (Onamiap) and the Organisation for Indigenous Women of the Central Selva of Peru (Omiaasec). The aim was to develop a program that met people's needs in the fairest way possible and, in the longer term, stop deforestation in the region.
They also partnered with international aid and tech organization AidKit to work out how to deliver cash to communities in the forest. The pilot project will now be adopted by Cool Earth as part of its ongoing work. The charity is scheduled to enter a project design phase later this year to collaborate with new communities in the central Amazon region of Peru, adding to the evidence base to inform policy discussions about basic income for conservation.
Cool Earth is also open to further long-term studies of impacts in the future. Designed as an alternative to traditional, top-down conservation approaches, the program was rooted in a principle of reciprocity, recognizing Indigenous communities as essential stewards of ecosystems rather than passive beneficiaries. Sofia Vargas, Cool Earth's Peru country manager, said, "Contrary to traditional critiques that basic income creates dependency or reduces work incentives, this first-of-a-kind pilot shows the opposite.
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