E/2002/43/Rev.1
E/CN.19/2002/3/Rev.1
education, coverage and educational quality for indigenous children and young
people through grants, academic opportunities or a pertinent curriculum. Due
respect should be given to teaching in indigenous languages. Indigenous peoples
seek the recognition of their rights to their history, languages, oral traditions, stories
and writings, of their traditional indigenous medicinal methods and of the
contribution of their own names for peoples and places;
(c) Requests that Governments include in their programmes and plans and in
their educational and cultural policies the contents of indigenous knowledge,
indigenous spiritual and religious traditions, indigenous customs and ceremonies, as
well as indigenous histories, visions of the cosmos, philosophies and values. The
rights of indigenous peoples to their sacred sites and ceremonial objects and to the
distribution of their ancestral remains should be respected. They wish to have their
cultural properties returned to them, particularly if those properties were taken
without their permission, as well as the restoration and protection of their
environment, lands and resources. The cultural heritage, made up of the
archaeological zones and sacred sites that are used for tourism, should be taught to
non-indigenous children and young people so that they know the contribution of
indigenous culture to all societies and to this globalized world.
6.
Environment
28. The Forum decides to request the following bodies — UNEP, the Convention
on Biological Diversity, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change, the United Nations Forum on Forests, UNDP, the Office of the United
Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, WHO, the World Bank, WIPO,
UNESCO, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the United Nations Conference on
Trade and Development (UNCTAD), UNICEF, the Global Environment Facility
(GEF), FAO, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification in Those
Countries Experiencing Serious Drought and/or Desertification, particularly in
Africa, and related entities, as well as representatives of indigenous peoples and
nations — to look into how they can be engaged in environmental and development
endeavours, with the following mandates:
(a) To conduct a comprehensive review of the mandates, policies and
programmes including financial and budgetary aspects of the various specialized
agencies within the United Nations system that relate to indigenous peoples and
their issues;
(b) To identify good and bad practices, coherence and divergence policies
and programmes, gaps, problems, obstacles in addressing the issues of indigenous
peoples within the United Nations system that fall within the mandate of the
Economic and Social Council.
29. The Forum recommends that WIPO, UNESCO, the Convention on Biological
Diversity, UNDP and FAO hold a technical workshop with Forum members and the
representatives of States and indigenous peoples and nations in order to promote
models for environmental and sustainable development governance that incorporates
principles of genuine partnership between States and indigenous peoples, linkages
between cultural diversity (language) and biological diversity, ecosystem approaches
and collaboration between scientific and traditional knowledge, and to evaluate
intellectual property regime; consider elaborating a sui generis system for the
protection of indigenous bio-cultural heritage, genetic resources and traditional
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