A/HRC/27/52/Add.3
325,106,786 nuevos soles (approximately 116.1 million US dollars), up to April 2013.
These projects have focused on investment in programmes to alleviate malnutrition,
education, health, sanitation and employment. In relation to the Camisea project, a
socioeconomic development fund49 was set up, which is distributed to the regional and local
governments affected to support social development projects and environmental protection.
60.
These fund investment mechanisms may be regarded as models that encourage the
development of social investment projects specifically intended for indigenous
communities. However, more needs to be done to ensure that extractive projects which
affect indigenous peoples benefit them beyond compensation for surface use of their
territories and for damages caused, or other benefits in the form of jobs or community
development projects, that typically pale in economic value in comparison to profits gained
by the corporation.
61.
The Special Rapporteur has earlier emphasized that an alternative model for
extractive activities in indigenous territories consists of indigenous peoples themselves
controlling the extractive operations, through their own initiatives and enterprises, for
example through partnerships with responsible non-indigenous companies, with the
necessary experience and funding to launch projects (A/HRC/24/41, para. 80). When
indigenous peoples choose to pursue their own initiatives for natural resource extraction
within their territories, States should assist them to build the capacity to do so and should
privilege these initiatives over others (ibid, para. 81).
62.
A possible consequence of the lack of opportunities for indigenous peoples to
participate in mining and hydrocarbon activities, and in the benefits derived from those, is
the presence across the Andean region of indigenous groups and individuals who engage in
informal or illegal small-scale mining. The Government has taken steps to address this
problem. For example, in January 2014, the Office of the President of the Council of
Ministers established the National Strategy to Prohibit Illegal Mining.50 This Strategy
appears to focus primarily on sanctioning illegal and informal mining, while the Special
Rapporteur would emphasize that, in addition, it is important to open channels to offer
these miners the possibility of formalization through registration, and to create incentives to
that end. It is also essential to engage a greater State presence in areas where informal and
illegal mining is carried out, and to strengthen the regulatory framework on mining. The
establishment, in February 2014, of the Multisectoral Technical Working Group, which will
design the budgetary programme for the eradication of illegal mining, the reduction of
mining and socio-environmental conflicts, and environmental compensation,51 could
contribute towards resolving these outstanding issues.
VIII. Indigenous peoples in a situation of voluntary isolation or
initial contact
63.
Act No. 28736 of 2006 on the Protection of Indigenous or Aboriginal Peoples in a
Situation of Isolation or Initial Contact establishes a “special cross-sectoral protection
system” for the rights of these peoples who live in parts of the Peruvian Amazon region. 52
The system provides for the establishment of indigenous reservations that are considered
“intangible”, within which no settlements, no activities and no development of natural
49
50
51
52
16
Established by Act No. 28451.
Supreme Decree No. 003-2014-PCM.
Ministerial Decision No. 026-2014-PCM.
Act No. 28736, arts. 1 and 4.
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