The Permanent Forum recommends that the Inter-Agency Support Group on Indigenous Peoples’ Issues compile a database on case studies showing the progress made by Member States and organizations regarding indigenous youth rights in the implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
The Permanent Forum recommends that the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) adopt an indigenous peoples’ policy and ensure the full and effective participation of indigenous peoples in the formulation of this policy and its programmes and projects.
The Permanent Forum also calls on the United Nations to ensure the active participation of indigenous peoples at the High-level Plenary Meeting of the sixty-fifth session of the General Assembly, to be held in September 2010.
With regard to paragraph 139 of the report of the Permanent Forum on its sixth session, the Forum calls upon Governments, indigenous peoples organizations, regional administrations and local self-governance organs of the countries of the Arctic region to take an active part in the discussion on the Arctic region at the eighth session of the Forum. The Forum urges the Board of Trustees of the United Nations Voluntary Fund for Indigenous Populations to give special consideration to applications from indigenous participants from the Arctic region.
The Permanent Forum urges the funds, programmes and agencies of the United Nations system to cooperate with States and indigenous peoples in the development and implementation of national action plans, strategies and other measures that aim to achieve the ends of the Declaration, including by providing support for the advancement and adjudication of the collective rights of indigenous peoples to their lands, territories and resources.
The Permanent Forum encourages States and United Nations agencies and funds to implement, in cooperation with indigenous peoples, proactive and substantive measures to realize the full and effective implementation of the rights affirmed in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. These measures must include greater accessibility for indigenous learners who live in remote areas or in nomadic communities. The Forum calls upon States to respect and implement article 19 of the Declaration by ensuring the free, prior and informed consent of indigenous peoples before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures that affect them.
The Permanent Forum recommends that the relevant United Nations agencies and Member States with reindeer herding peoples support training and education programmes for indigenous reindeer herding youth and communities in order to secure the future sustainability and resilience of the Arctic and sub-Arctic indigenous pastoral reindeer herding societies and cultures in the face of climate change, land-use change and globalization.
The Permanent Forum recommends that all United Nations agencies concerned with water, including UNESCO and the International Hydrological Programme, UNICEF, WHO, UNDP, the United Nations Environment Programme and FAO, give full support to the planning, development and implementation of an indigenous world forum on water in order to give voice to the indigenous peoples’ perspective of protection and access to all sources of water and its sacred role in the indigenous context.
The Permanent Forum continues to be concerned that the World Bank’s new environmental and social safeguard 7 allows the conversion of the collective territories of indigenous peoples into individual ownership rights, even though it recognizes the importance of protecting the collective attachment of indigenous peoples to their lands. Providing funding for States to divide the lands of indigenous peoples generates conflict, irreparably harms livelihoods and traditional resource management strategies and erodes the governance structures of indigenous peoples. Paragraph 29 of environmental and social safeguard 7 should urgently be revised to ensure that indigenous peoples maintain their collective rights to lands, territories and resources in all projects funded by the Bank.
The Permanent Forum therefore urges the World Health Organization to develop a strategy and programme to tackle self-harm and suicide among indigenous children and young people at the global level. The Forum recommends taking into account the initiatives that are being conducted at the regional level, in particular by the Pan American Health Organization, and using them as a basis for further expansion. As a first step, the Forum suggests that the World Health Organization gather evidence and initiate research on the prevalence of self-harm and suicide among indigenous children and young people at the global level and prepare a compilation of good practices on prevention of self-harm and suicide among indigenous young people, publishing its findings by 1 January 2017.
The Permanent Forum recommends that United Nations agencies and actors coordinate in the development and implementation of an international research project on the sexual and reproductive health of indigenous peoples, ensuring an active partnership with indigenous peoples and organizations in all stages of the project.
In reference to the study by Mr. John and Ms. Dorough on how States exploit weak procedural rules in international organizations to devalue the United Nations Declaration and other international human rights law, the Permanent Forum recommends that all funds, programmes and specialized agencies of the United Nations system and other intergovernmental forums begin to reform their respective procedural rules, with the full and effective participation of indigenous peoples, with the aim of ensuring compliance and consistency with the human rights affirmed in the Declaration.