The Permanent Forum welcomes the policy guides that are being developed by UN-Habitat, including on housing for indigenous peoples in the urban setting, which will be presented at the upcoming session of the World Urban Forum, to be held from 3 to 7 November 2008, in Nanjing, China. States are encouraged to support the production of the guidelines.
The Permanent Forum welcomes the recognition by UNICEF of the valuable contributions indigenous children and youth can make in their local communities to ensure the sustainability of climate change adaptation and mitigation plans. The Forum urges the Fund to continue to raise awareness of the impact of climate change on indigenous children and youth, and requests that it ensure the effective participation of indigenous children and youth in the discussions on and solutions to environmental issues in accordance with article 12 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
The Permanent Forum recommends that the Statistics Commission advocate for the promotion of indigenous peoples’ issues in the 2010 round of population and housing censuses and the Demographic and Health Survey, and other surveys and censuses, taking into account the global synthesis report on indicators of well-being, poverty and sustainability submitted at the seventh session of the Forum. The Forum calls on all relevant United Nations agencies to support this initiative.