Among Indigenous Peoples and local communities and their organisations, including SwedBio partners, the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UN PFII) is  an important reference point for engagement in the UN system. The Permanent Forum provides expert advice and recommendations on indigenous issues to all agencies of the United Nations. Another task is to raise awareness and promote the integration and coordination of activities related to indigenous issues within the UN system. For instance, each CBD Working Group meeting on traditional knowledge has a specific agenda point “Recommendations from the UN Permanent Forum”. As an example, the successful negotiations of agreeing on using the terminology “indigenous peoples” within the CBD, where SwedBio and partners were deeply engaged over several CBD meetings, came out from a repeated recommendation from UN PFII.

This year, the UN PFII, held its 16th session in the UN Headquarters in New York. The special Theme was: “Tenth Anniversary of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: measures taken to implement the Declaration”

During the first week of the meeting, SwedBio co-organised two side events together with partners:
2017-04-20