Recalling the international expert Workshop on Data Collection and Disaggregation for Indigenous Peoples (see E/C.19/2004/2, for the report thereon), the Forum welcomes the collaboration with the United Nations Statistics Division in reviewing national practices in data collection and dissemination in the areas of ethnicity, language and religion and looks forward to the Demographic Yearbook special topic which will include data and analysis relevant to indigenous peoples. The Forum is also pleased to note that data on national and/or ethnic groups are being made available online by the Statistics Division at the following website: http://unstats.un.org/unsd/demographic/products/dyb/dybcens.htm
In light of this work, as well as the 2010 World Population and Housing Census Program, the Forum supports the Statistics Division in: (a) continuing its work in reviewing national practices in data collection and dissemination on issues relevant to indigenous peoples; (b) considering the extent to which the revision of the Principles and Recommendations for Population and Housing Censuses can further address national and international data needs by facilitating the collection of data on indigenous peoples; c) Continuing to follow the recommendations of the international expert Workshop on Data Collection and Disaggregation for Indigenous Peoples; (d) Strengthening user-producer consultation in data collection and dissemination efforts
The Permanent Forum welcomes the decision by FAO to observe an International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists in 2026 and encourages Member States to support the participation of indigenous peoples in events leading up to the year.
The Forum recommends that the World Conservation Union Congress, to be held in November 2004 in Bangkok, endorse the recommendations on indigenous peoples and protected areas, as well as other relevant recommendations (such as on sacred sites) adopted by the Fifth World Parks Congress. It should also emphasize the need for the recognition of community conserved areas and indigenous peoples’ protected areas, the need for the full respect for indigenous peoples’ rights and the need for indigenous peoples’ free prior informed consent to be obtained before the declaration or in the management of any protected area which may affect them.
The Forum recommends that the United Nations system urge all States to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, the Bio-Safety Protocol, the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (the Conference of Parties to the Stockholm Convention should establish mechanisms for indigenous peoples to maintain an active presence at its meeting), the Rotterdam Convention on Hazardous Chemicals, the Basel Convention on the Control of the Transboundary Movement of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal and its 1995 prohibition on the export of hazardous waste from the countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development to non-member countries, and 1996 Protocol to the London Convention on marine waste deposits etc.
The Permanent Forum urges its secretariat, in cooperation with the secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity, to organize a side-event on the occasion of the fifth meeting of the Ad Hoc Open-ended Working Group on Access and Benefit-sharing of the Convention on Biological Diversity, as an occasion for the co-chairs of the Working Group, States parties and other interested groups to consider the conclusions and recommendations contained in the report of the international expert group meeting, held from 17 to 19 January 2007, on the Convention on Biological Diversity’s international regime on access and benefit-sharing and indigenous peoples’ human rights.
The Permanent Forum applauds the effective participation mechanisms for indigenous peoples in such mechanisms as the Convention on Biological Diversity Working Group on article 8 (j) and related provisions, and recommends that, in accordance with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, such practices be extended to all critical areas of interest to indigenous peoples, such as the Working Group on Access and Benefit-sharing and in particular the Working Group on Protected Areas.
The Forum urges States to undertake and promote the expansion of their national health systems in order to provide holistic health programmes for indigenous children that incorporate preventive medical practices and family and community participation. States are urged to address the issues of malnutrition of indigenous children victimized by poverty by adopting special measures to ensure and protect the cultivation of traditional food crops.
The Permanent Forum reiterates the recommendation contained in paragraph 47 of its report on its seventeenth session and calls upon Member States to begin work on a global, legally binding regime for toxic industrial chemicals and hazardous pesticides under the Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent Procedure for Certain Hazardous Chemicals and Pesticides in International Trade.
The Permanent Forum recommends that the Government of Paraguay should make resolute progress towards the development of a land registry that will facilitate land titling, and thus the recovery of land by indigenous communities and the territorial reconstitution of their respective peoples.
The Permanent Forum urges States, in cooperation with indigenous peoples, to develop and implement specific laws and mechanisms to protect indigenous human rights defenders, to ensure that attacks against them are investigated and that those persons responsible are held accountable.
The Permanent Forum recommends that a task force be created within the Inter-Agency Support Group on Indigenous Issues to specifically address migration issues of indigenous peoples, as suggested in the 2006 Geneva workshop on this matter (E/C.19/2007/CRP.5).
The Permanent Forum strongly supports the position expressed in the outcome document of the Durban Review Conference that States should take all necessary measures to implement the rights of indigenous peoples.