72 LABOUR RIGHTS to higher unemployment rates of ethnic minorities, including minority women, and their disproportional lack of training and educational opportunities and their overrepresentation in low-paid jobs. The Committee regularly requests states to collect and make available statistical information on the participation of minorities in education and the labour market; the Committee views the availability of knowledge about the situation of minority groups as a crucial element concerning the application of the Convention. For example, the government of Brazil was requested to provide indicators and statistical data on the impact of its equal opportunity policy on the distribution of the indigenous, black and mestizo population in the various sectors of economic activity and at different occupational levels. The ILO then put some programmes into effect to assist the government achieving its equal opportunity objectives. The Committee of Experts has stressed that the elimination of discrimination in employment and occupation on all grounds is critical to sustainable development. It tends to examine discrimination against minorities in the world of work, not as an isolated phenomenon, but as an aspect of the broader social, cultural and economic context. For example, based on a trade union complaint of 1989, the Committee of Experts addressed the attempts to suppress the cultural identity of the Turkish minority in Bulgaria, particularly the compulsory change of names and the prohibition of using the Turkish language. ILO standards and indigenous peoples Indigenous peoples are usually – but not always – minorities. All the comments about protection of the rights of minorities apply also to indigenous peoples. In addition, the rights spelt out below for indigenous and tribal peoples may be valid goals also for other ethnic and religious minorities, especially if they are quite separate from the dominant population. There is only one international convention7 that covers all aspects of this subject: the ILO’s Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, (No. 169), which promotes respect for the cultures and institutions of indigenous peoples and presumes their right to existence within national societies, to establish their own institutions and to determine their own path of development. Under the Convention, governments have to consult with the peoples concerned with regard to measures that may directly affect them. Indigenous and tribal peoples have the right to participate in decision-making processes regarding policies and programmes that concern them.8 Convention No. 169 is not primarily a workers’ rights convention, except insofar as most indigenous peoples are workers. It does promote the inclusion of members of these peoples in vocational guidance and training, as well as education, that is adapted to their needs and will help them continue and adapt their