THE RIGHTS TO FOOD AND WATER belonging to indigenous groups) under Article 27 of the ICCPR, which recognizes the relationship between traditional food systems and cultural diversity.13 In many indigenous cultures, indigenous peoples fish or hunt for food as a part of a practice, custom or tradition, which is an integral part of their distinctive culture,14 such as Kihals in Pakistan – fisher peoples whose food and livelihood depends on specific fish and tortoise food production which has been threatened by dam building;15 and pastoralists of East Africa – for whom ranging of cattle is an integral custom and a source of food and income.16 The Declaration of Atitl’an, adopted at the first Indigenous Peoples’ Global Consultation in 2001, on the right to food and food security, has also articulated the cultural aspect of food, water and means of subsistence.17 Many ethnic minorities and indigenous communities living in remote areas rely on foods they can forage from the forests that surround their villages.18 Ecological deterioration because of migration, development programmes and war, have resulted in dwindling natural resources and the loss of subsistence, leading to malnutrition and food insecurity. The importance of the control of peoples over natural resources appears in many instruments (the ICESCR, ICCPR) and specific reference to the rights of indigenous peoples in relation to natural resources pertaining to their lands is found in the ILO’s Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention (No. 169). The Convention on Biological Diversity, under Article 8(j) recognizes the role and knowledge of indigenous and local communities in the preservation of the world’s biological resources, elements necessary for the enjoyment of the right to food and subsistence.19 Other important provisions for our purposes are contained in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (Arts. 24, 30) and in the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (Art. 12),20 the Declaration the Rights of Persons Belonging to Ethnic, Religious or Linguistic Minorities (Arts. 1-3), the Declaration on the Right to Development (Art. 1); and ILO Conventions Nos. 107 and 169 (Arts. 2, 3, 5, 7, 13). A range of declarations and resolutions21 have elaborated the standards relating to the right to food: the UN Millennium Declaration, 2000 and Millennium Declaration Goal 1;22 the Declaration of the World Food Summit: Five Years Later (2002);23 and the voluntary guidelines to ‘support the progressive realization of the right to adequate food in the context of national food security’ adopted by the UN Food and Agriculture Committee (FAO) on World Food Security (CFS) in September 2004.24 At the regional level, the San Salvador Additional Protocol to the InterAmerican Convention on Human Rights explicitly recognizes the right to adequate nutrition. And while the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights does not 19