The United Nations General Assembly during its 47^th session on Report of the Third Committee, adopted the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Agenda Item 67(a), A/RES/74/135  draft A/74/396 with focus on the implementation of the SDGs, and the participation of indigenous peoples in decision making processes related to human rights and the climate change agenda. The UNGA adopted this resolution without a vote, covering a range of issues including a push for the realization of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) adopted in 2007. This resolution also prompted the Secretary-General to include information pertinent to indigenous peoples on the upcoming annual reports on the progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals. Governments were urged to promote actions to eliminate malnutrition of indigenous children and to engage with indigenous peoples at the local, national and regional levels in relation to the Sustainable Development Goals.

In line with the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) 2020s’ central topic, “Peace, justice and strong institutions: the role of indigenous peoples in implementing Sustainable Development Goal 16”; United Nations General Assembly made emphasis   on the measures the States should take to ensure the empowerment and full and effective participation of Indigenous Peoples decision making processes of their concern.

In preparation for the 2020 discussion, the FAO Indigenous Peoples Unit has already provided recommendations in specific issues related to FAO’s mandate including collective rights, access to land tenure and Free Prior & Informed Consent.

In these crucial times for the development and climate change agenda FAO has been working to coordinate efforts with indigenous peoples representatives, towards the inclusion of their cultures traditional knowledge in the implementation of the SDGs and the climate change agreements. This includes the support of  the monitoring of SDG 2 in indigenous territories with indigenous peoples participation to assure an intercultural approach; advocating and providing technical assistance and facilitating dialogue with the public institutions regarding collective rights and the management of natural resources in indigenous territories, through soft law instruments such as the Voluntary Guidelines on the Governance of Land Tenure, the Small Scale Fisheries Guidelines, and several Forestry monitoring and sustainable activities.

Furthermore under the leadership of Canada, in 2019 17 countries agreed in FAO Rome headquarters the establishment of a group of friends of indigenous peoples where FAO will act as the secretariat of the group.

The FAO Indigenous Peoples’ Unit coordinates a network of more than 40 national and regional focal points among the FAO decentralized offices. In 2019, the indigenous peoples network in Latin-America and Asia and the FAO Indigenous Peoples Unit have several meetings to discuss challenges, experiences and to coordinate the FAO’s work with indigenous peoples at country and regional level.

Another important outcome of the resolution is the decision of expanding the mandate of the United Nations Voluntary Fund for Indigenous Peoples to make sure that indigenous peoples are heard in international forums of the global human rights, development and environmental agenda.

The resolution aims to prevent violence against specific groups of peoples such as indigenous women, children, youth, older persons and persons with disabilities. UNGA proclaimed 2022-2032 as the International Decade of Indigenous languages, following a successful International Year of Indigenous Languages 2019 (IYIL2019). FAOs Indigenous peoples Unit has translated the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure and the Free, Prior and Informed Consent manual in several Indigenous languages.

The Resolution is available here: https://undocs.org/A/74/396