A/77/238 (c) Apply a strict rights-based approach to the creation or expansion of existing protected areas; (d) Only extend protected areas to overlap with indigenous territories when indigenous peoples have given their free, prior and informed consent; (e) Ensure that indigenous peoples have the right of access to their lands and resources and undertake their activities in accordance with their world view, which has ensured the sustainable conservation of the environment for generations, and halt the criminalization of indigenous peoples carrying out sustainable activities linked to their way of life, activities that may be forbidden to non-indigenous peoples; (f) Protect indigenous peoples from encroachment on their ancestral lands and strictly forbid logging and extractive activities in protected areas; (g) Accept official country visits by special procedures to investigate alleged human rights violations at World Heritage sites and in other protected areas. 71. Member States, United Nations agencies, donors and all actors involved in conservation should: (a) Allocate funding to support indigenous-led conservancies, and create intercultural channels of communication to encourage the full participation of indigenous peoples in the management of protected areas and the inclusion of indigenous knowledge systems in conservation; (b) Implement efforts to ensure that indigenous peoples, including indigenous women, are well represented in decision-making processes, and adopt a rights-based approach at each stage of the design, implementation and assessment of conservation measures; (c) Learn from indigenous knowledge systems to determine, together with indigenous peoples, conservation protocols related to sacred areas or spaces and important species; (d) Protect and promote the role of indigenous women in preserving, transmitting, applying and developing indigenous scientific knowledge related to conservation and the protection of biodiversity; (e) Include, in collaboration with indigenous peoples, the knowledge and rights of indigenous peoples in conservation-related education curricula; (f) Institute and apply indigenous hiring preferences when recruiting officials for the management of protected areas and environmental protection; (g) In consultation with indigenous peoples, ensure transparent and equitable benefit-sharing for their contributions to biodiversity protection on their lands and territories, and ensure that funding directed towards indigenous peoples is managed by them; (h) Support the development of the capacity of indigenous peoples to participate in and influence international conservation processes, including the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, the nomination and management of World Heritage sites, and the planning and monitoring of, and reporting on, REDD-plus and other conservation and climate change mitigation projects; (i) Adopt a culturally appropriate human-rights based approach when planning and implementing conservation projects, including REDD-plus initiatives, taking into consideration indigenous peoples’ distinct and special relationship to land, waters, territories and resources, and ensure that 22-11289 19/20