Conservation, environmental and other non-governmental organizations ensure that their forest-related programmes and policies use the human rights-based and ecosystem approach to forest conservation. This includes the integration of the implementation of the Declaration in their forest programmes.
The Permanent Forum recommends that forests that have been taken by States from indigenous peoples without their free, prior and informed consent in the name of conservation policies be restored immediately.
The Forum recommends that the Global Fund review their funding strategy in order to include access by indigenous non-governmental organizations and health providers for community-based culturally appropriate HIV/AIDS programmes.
The Permanent Forum recommends that States develop mechanisms through which they can monitor and report on the impacts of climate change on indigenous peoples, mindful of their socio-economic limitations as well as spiritual and cultural attachment to lands and waters.
The Permanent Forum invites the newly established Facilitative Working Group of the local communities and indigenous peoples platform to collaborate closely with bodies outside the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change on matters relating to climate change and indigenous peoples, in accordance with its mandate (Conference of the Parties decision 2/CP.24, para. 20).
Considering the bloody wars and grave conflicts that have afflicted a range of States in Africa during the last decade, the Permanent Forum recommends that United Nations agencies (IOM, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), UNICEF, UNFPA, the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), UNDP and WHO) and African States urgently convene a general meeting on health in order to evaluate the negative effects of these conflicts on the health of indigenous peoples and to find appropriate solutions to address the issue.
The Permanent Forum recommends that, in the Arctic, Amazon and Congo basins and the Sahara oases, which are indicators of climate change for the rest of the world, Member States work closely with indigenous peoples. The discussions and negotiations on climate change should respect the rights of indigenous peoples to nurture and develop their traditional knowledge and their environment-friendly technologies. In the case of indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation and inhabiting the most biodiverse areas in the Amazon, the primary requirement of their free prior and informed consent for any alien intervention must be stressed.
The Permanent Forum urges Member States and United Nations entities, in particular the World Health Organization (WHO), to recognize that Indigenous views of human and planetary health must be central to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and emphasizes the central need to stabilize and regenerate the biosphere as essential for protecting humanity. The right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment, the right to health and development and the rights of Indigenous Peoples must be seen as interconnected and essential to an integrated planetary health governance framework.
In the context of the implementation of the Policy on Ethnicity and Health, adopted by the executive committee of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) in 2017 (CE160.R11), the Permanent Forum invites PAHO and the World Health Organization (WHO) to collaborate with health institutions and policymakers to address issues related to indigenous maternal health, including the practice of indigenous midwifery. It recommends that PAHO prepare a study on the advancements in indigenous maternal health, including best practices used by indigenous midwives and supportive organizations. The Forum invites PAHO to submit the report by 2020.
The Permanent Forum urges the International Union for Conservation of Nature and the secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity to undertake, in collaboration with indigenous peoples, a study on the contributions of indigenous peoples to the management of ecosystems and the protection of biodiversity, and submit a report to the Forum by its nineteenth session.
The Permanent Forum recommends that the International Finance Corporation establish a mechanism of engagement with indigenous peoples in the context of its sustainability framework, including Performance Standard 7, on indigenous peoples.
The Permanent Forum reiterates to the parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, and especially to the parties to the Nagoya Protocol, the importance of respecting and protecting indigenous peoples’ rights to genetic resources consistent with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Consistent with the objective of “fair and equitable” benefit sharing in the Convention and Protocol, all rights based on customary use must be safeguarded and not only “established” rights. The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has concluded that such kinds of distinctions would be discriminatory.