The Permanent Forum notes with appreciation the active engagement of UNFPA with indigenous peoples in the regions of Latin America and Asia, as well as its detailed reporting on its work in these areas. The Permanent Forum invites UNFPA to continue reporting on its work and recommends that future reports deal with agency activities in all sociocultural regions or, if no relevant activities are under way in a particular region, the challenges to addressing indigenous issues in such regions.
The Permanent Forum urges UNDP to further strengthen the right to self-determination of indigenous peoples by choosing indigenous peoples’ organizations as their implementing partners and responsible parties in their projects involving indigenous peoples, especially those with established track records in project implementation. As a corollary to the foregoing, government agencies created to promote and protect the rights and interests of indigenous peoples should be preferred as implementing partners in UNDP programming on indigenous peoples’ issues so that they can effectively perform their mandate
The Permanent Forum recommends that the Open Working Group on Sustainable Development Goals and the United Nations system ensure the inclusion and meaningful participation of indigenous peoples in all processes relating to the elaboration of the sustainable development goals. In this regard, the Forum recommends that indigenous peoples and their organizations and representatives participate in the dialogues between Member States and civil society during meetings of the Group.
Recalling its recommendations made at its first, sixth and ninth sessions that called for publication of the report entitled “State of the world’s indigenous peoples”, the Permanent Forum requests the Department of Economic and Social Affairs to continue its publication of the document on a quadrennial basis.