The Permanent Forum welcomes the establishment of the Network of the Centers of Distinction on Indigenous and Local Knowledge under the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. The Network, which comprises indigenous leaders, experts, professionals and advocates of indigenous and local knowledge, serves to promote the integrity and value of the knowledge of indigenous peoples and local communities in science and policy. In addition, the Forum notes the aspects relevant to indigenous peoples that the Platform has rolled out until 2030 in its work programme and, in that regard, seeks to further its collaboration with the Platform in its own future work. The Forum invites the Platform and the Network to continue to inform the Forum about the progress of their work, including at the Forum’s twenty-first session.
The Permanent Forum calls on the European Commission, United Nations agencies, the World Bank Group, the Asian Development Bank, bilateral development agencies, export credit agencies and international and regional financial institutions, such as the Japan Bank for International Cooperation, to review, strengthen and implement their policies with regard to indigenous peoples in general, and indigenous peoples in Asia in particular, and to use the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples,1 as a framework for reference.
The Forum notes with satisfaction the recent activation of the Trust Fund for the support of the Forum, expresses its deep appreciation and thanks to all those who contributed to it and calls upon Governments, foundations and intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations to give generously to the Fund.
With a view to assessing the effectiveness of the implementation of policies on indigenous peoples, the Permanent Forum recommends to the United Nations entities that carry out free, prior and informed consent processes to develop a system for comprehensively documenting these processes.
The Permanent Forum recognizes the importance of exploring possibilities for strengthening cooperation with the human rights treaty bodies on issues of relevance to its mandate. The Permanent Forum therefore invites the Chairs of the human rights treaty bodies each to designate a representative to participate in the twenty-second session of the Permanent Forum, to be held in 2023.
The Permanent Forum requests United Nations entities, in particular those working on land tenure and changes in land use, to advance the research on securing the land and territorial rights of indigenous peoples, taking into account the negative impacts of, inter alia, the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) global pandemic and regional conflicts.