Explore the key themes the Forest Peoples Programme addresses, including Human Rights, Climate Change and Biodiversity, Business, Trade and Finance, Deforestation, Community Governance, and Culture and Knowledge.
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In this section: Lands, Territories, and Resources; Self-Determination and FPIC; and Human Rights Defenders
Indigenous peoples have symbiotic relationships with their ancestral territories which are central to their identity, survival, well-being and self-determined development.
Self-determination is the right of all peoples, including indigenous peoples and forest peoples, to determine their futures.
The term “human rights defender” (HRD) refers to people or groups who take peaceful actions to promote or protect human rights.
In this section: Climate Change; and Biodiversity
Climate change refers to alterations in global or regional weather patterns, primarily driven by increased levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Biodiversity refers to the variety and variability of life on Earth, encompassing all forms of flora and fauna. It is essential for the resilience and sustainability of natural systems and is vital for life on Earth.
In this section: Palm Oil; Timber, Pulp and Paper; Carbon and Biodiversity Markets; Infrastructure; Certification; Regulation; and Other Commodities.
The rapid growth in palm oil production to feed global demands for edible oils and biofuels is causing serious social and environmental problems yet plantations are set to double their extent in the next 20 years.
Driven by growing global demand, the pulp and paper sector is undergoing rapid expansion. Clearing forests and replacing them with plantations of Eucalyptus and Acacia, the industry has taken over millions of hectares of indigenous peoples’ and forest peoples’ lands.
Questions about the role of carbon and biodiversity markets in addressing the climate and nature crises are subject to significant debate both inside and outside intergovernmental climate and biodiversity negotiations.
The current model of economic globalisation is driving unprecedented demand for the world’s remaining resources including oil, gas, coal and minerals.
In recent decades there has been a major expansion of large-scale infrastructure projects into indigenous peoples’ and forest peoples’ lands and territories in tropically forested countries.
In the past 30 years, a number of certification schemes have been developed in response to the environmental and social challenges posed by expanding industrial agriculture and natural resource extraction.
Regulation focuses on the legal regulation of corporate behaviour across a range of industry sectors. Such regulation is often in its infancy, having been recently adopted or in the process of being developed.
Tropical forests continue to be cleared at an alarming rate to make way for industrial agriculture, extractive industries, and infrastructure development. These direct drivers of deforestation are often fuelled by laws and policies that fail to respect rightsholders.
Community governance refers to the systems, structures, and practices that indigenous communities use to make decisions and manage their communities, territories and relationships with their neighbours.
Culture and knowledge in the context of indigenous peoples and forest peoples is the body of knowledge, practices, and beliefs passed down through generations, integral to their cultural identities and survival.
Our work programmes and projects are shaped by the priorities of the communities with whom we work, in collaboration with civil society partners, networks and other allies. That work is organised via three core programmes: Environmental Governance Programme, Responsible Finance Programme, and Legal and Human Rights Programme; and a cross-cutting Gender Justice Programme.
The Environmental Governance Programme supports the development of innovative strategies to amplify the voices of indigenous peoples and forest peoples in solving the biodiversity and climate crisis.
Through our work on Territorial Governance, we seek to innovate and implement mapping, monitoring and management tools.
Our work on Culture and Knowledge aims to ensure that the communities we work with can live according to their traditional practices, using their languages and on their ancestral lands.
Our Conservation and Human Rights work supports indigenous peoples and forest peoples to assert their rights to own, occupy, protect, and conserve their ancestral land and territories according to their knowledge and skills.
The Responsible Finance Programme works in solidarity with indigenous peoples and forest peoples towards a global economic system that enables them to thrive and enjoy their internationally recognised human rights, to practice their chosen livelihoods and to maintain their own economies.
FPP works with indigenous peoples and forest peoples to reform commodity production and associated supply chains and trade through engagement with voluntary certification schemes and multi-stakeholder initiatives.
FPP accompanies indigenous peoples and forest peoples in their efforts to identify and challenge public and private financial actors enabling activities that harm their lands, territories and resources.
FPP supports indigenous peoples and forest peoples to be recognised as rights-holders, knowledge-holders and agents of positive change in national and international climate and forest policy.
The Legal and Human Rights Programme seeks to ensure respect for and protection of indigenous peoples and forest peoples’ rights, including their rights to self-determination, lands, territories, and resources, and free prior and informed consent (FPIC).
Our legal empowerment work ensures that resilient and self-governing indigenous peoples and forest peoples are aware of their rights can effectively use customary, national and international legal systems to defend those rights.
We support indigenous peoples' and forest peoples’ access to justice through facilitating their strategic use a wide range of judicial and non-judicial mechanisms when their collective rights are violated.
We facilitate people-led, research-driven, human rights-based law and policy reform at national and international levels through collaborating with indigenous peoples and forest peoples.
Gender justice is integral in all the work the Forest Peoples Programme does to support indigenous peoples and forest peoples in their efforts to secure collective land tenure and practice self-determination.
Imagine a world in which laws concerning Indigenous women and forest women were developed with their full and effective participation and consent.
FPP supports partner-led actions that strengthen Indigenous women’s and forest women’s leadership and meaningful participation in local, national, regional and global decision-making spaces.
Understanding the gender/ing of people, places, and dynamics is essential to how we tell stories.
FPP has organisation-wide initiatives that respond to cross-cutting and commonly expressed needs across all our partnerships. These are the Strategic Legal Response Centre and Forest Visions.
The Strategic Legal Response Centre (SLRC) is one of FPP’s priority initiatives and was established in 2021 to magnify FPP’s legal support to indigenous peoples and forest peoples.
Forest Visions is a sub-granting vehicle established by Forest Peoples Programme to respond to a key gap in the funding ecosystem, by directly supporting indigenous peoples and forest peoples to realise their visions for their lands and territories.
FPP is part of a wider movement towards social justice and securing the rights of indigenous peoples and forest peoples to their lands, territories, and resources. As part of our commitment to movement building and understanding that collaborative approaches have scale and reach that no individual organisation can provide, we seek to make the most of opportunities for collaboration with partners and allies
The Indigenous-Led Education Network (ILED) is a collaboration established in 2020 to support indigenous peoples to continue passing on their knowledge systems, cultures, and languages.
Founded in 2014, the Indigenous Navigator is a framework and set of tools for and by indigenous peoples to systematically monitor the level of recognition and implementation of their rights.
The Local Biodiversity Outlooks presents the perspectives and experiences of indigenous peoples and local communities in the implementation of the CBD.
The Accountability Framework initiative (AFi) is a collective effort of diverse organisations dedicated to protecting forests, natural ecosystems, and human rights.
Transformative Pathways is a joint initiative led by indigenous organisations in four countries across Asia, Africa, and the Americas, and supported by a network of global partners.
The aim of the Whakatane Mechanism is to assess the situation in different protected areas around the world and, where people are negatively affected, to propose solutions and implement them.
The Zero Tolerance Initiative (ZTI) is led by indigenous peoples, community representatives, and supportive NGOs working collectively to address the root causes of killings and violence against human rights defenders linked to global supply chains.
Explore our resource section for insightful reports, publications and training materials.
FPP’s Theory of Change is discussed in more detail in our Strategic Framework Plan 2025–30.
Read the plan
