Skip to content

Our Work
- Themes
  Themes
  
  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.
  
  View All
  - Human Rights
    
    Human Rights
    
    In this section: Lands, Territories, and Resources; Self-Determination and FPIC; and Human Rights Defenders
    
    View All
    
    Lands, Territories and Resources
    
    Lands, Territories and Resources
    
    Land, territories and resource rights refer to the legal or customary rights that communities have over land, territories and natural resources such as water, forests, minerals, and biodiversity.
    
    View All
    
    Self Determination and FPIC
    
    Self Determination and FPIC
    
    FPIC and self-determination are essential for indigenous peoples and forest peoples as they uphold their rights, autonomy, and sovereignty over their lands, territories, and resources.
    
    View All
    
    Human Rights Defenders
    
    Human Rights Defenders
    
    The term “human rights defender” (HRD) refers to people or groups who take peaceful actions to promote or protect human rights.
    
    View All
  - Climate Change and Biodiversity
    
    Climate Change and Biodiversity
    
    In this section: Climate Change; and Biodiversity
    
    View All
    
    Climate Change
    
    Climate Change
    
    Climate change refers to alterations in global or regional weather patterns, primarily driven by increased levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
    
    View All
    
    Biodiversity
    
    Biodiversity
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Business, Trade and Finance
    
    Business, Trade and Finance
    
    In this section: Palm Oil; Timber, Pulp and Paper; Carbon and Biodiversity Markets; Minerals and Energy; Infrastructure; Certification; and Regulation
    
    View All
    
    Palm Oil
    
    Palm Oil
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Timber, Pulp and Paper
    
    Timber, Pulp and Paper
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Carbon and Biodiversity Markets
    
    Carbon and Biodiversity Markets
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Minerals and Energy
    
    Minerals and Energy
    
    The current model of economic globalisation is driving unprecedented demand for the world’s remaining resources including oil, gas, coal and minerals.
    
    View All
    
    Infrastructure
    
    Infrastructure
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Certification
    
    Certification
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Regulation
    
    Regulation
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Deforestation
    
    Deforestation
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Focus on the Frontline
  - Community Governance
    
    Community Governance
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Culture and Knowledge
    
    Culture and Knowledge
    
    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.
    
    View All
- Our Programmes
  Our Programmes
  
  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.
  
  View All
  - Environmental Governance
    
    Environmental Governance
    
    The Environmental Governance programme seeks to ensure that indigenous peoples and forest peoples have full access to and control over their lands and territories in accordance with their cultures and spirituality, practices and innovations, and care for their environment.
    
    View All
    
    Territorial Governance
    
    Territorial Governance
    
    Through our work on Territorial Governance, we seek to innovate and implement mapping, monitoring and management tools.
    
    View All
    
    Culture and Knowledge
    
    Culture and Knowledge
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Conservation and human rights
    
    Conservation and human rights
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Conservation Pathways
  - Responsible Finance
    
    Responsible Finance
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Supply Chains and Trade
    
    Supply Chains and Trade
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Global Finance
    
    Global Finance
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Climate and forest policy and finance
    
    Climate and forest policy and finance
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Legal and Human Rights
    
    Legal and Human Rights
    
    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).
    
    View All
    
    Legal Empowerment
    
    Legal Empowerment
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Access to Justice
    
    Access to Justice
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Law and Policy Reform
    
    Law and Policy Reform
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Gender Justice
    
    Gender Justice
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Advancing Legal Protections
    
    Advancing Legal Protections
    
    Imagine a world in which laws concerning Indigenous women and forest women were developed with their full and effective participation and consent.
    
    View All
    
    Partner Led Actions
    
    Partner Led Actions
    
    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.
    
    View All
    
    Communications and Resources
    
    Communications and Resources
    
    Understanding the gender/ing of people, places, and dynamics is essential to how we tell stories.
    
    View All
- Priority Initiatives
  Priority Initiatives
  
  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.
  
  View All
  - Strategic Legal Response Centre
    
    Strategic Legal Response Centre
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Forest Visions
    
    Forest Visions
    
    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.
    
    View All
- Priority Collaborations
  Priority Collaborations
  
  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
  
  View All
  - Indigenous Led Education (ILED)
    
    Indigenous Led Education (ILED)
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Indigenous Navigator
    
    Indigenous Navigator
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Local Biodiversity Outlooks (LBO)
    
    Local Biodiversity Outlooks (LBO)
    
    The Local Biodiversity Outlooks presents the perspectives and experiences of indigenous peoples and local communities in the implementation of the CBD.
    
    View All
  - The Accountability Framework initiative (AFi)
    
    The Accountability Framework initiative (AFi)
    
    The Accountability Framework initiative (AFi) is a collective effort of diverse organisations dedicated to protecting forests, natural ecosystems, and human rights.
    
    View All
  - Transformative Pathways
    
    Transformative Pathways
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Whakatane Mechanism
    
    Whakatane Mechanism
    
    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.
    
    View All
  - Zero Tolerance Initiative (ZTI)
    
    Zero Tolerance Initiative (ZTI)
    
    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.
    
    View All
Community Voices
Partners & Countries
- Partners
- Countries
Latest News
Publications & Resources
Publications & Resources

Explore our resource section for insightful reports, publications and training materials.

View All

Association of Saamaka Traditional Authorities (VSG) - Vereniging van Saamaka Gezagsdragers

The Association of Saramaka Authorities (VSG) was established in 1996 with the aim to represent the position of traditional Saamaka leaders and their people from 77 villages in relation to increasing human and land rights violations by the Surinamese state.

Partners details

Region:

Related resources

Supply Chain Solutions for People and Forests

26 June 2018

Supply Chain Solutions for People and Forests

26 June 2018

Spanish Indonesian French

MEDIA ADVISORY: Call To Action for greater human rights and land tenure protections in UK/EU Business and Trade

19 February 2018

Press Release - Indigenous and human rights defenders visiting the EU call for stronger rights protections in agro-commodity business and policies for deforestation-free trade and investment

15 February 2018

Access to Justice Human Rights Defenders Human Rights English

Spanish French Indonesian

Report on the situation of indigenous tribal peoples in Suriname

16 July 2015

Access to Justice Legal Empowerment Conservation and human rights Law and Policy Reform Human Rights Self Determination and FPIC English

Request for Consideration of the Situation of the Saramaka People of Suriname under the UN CERD's Urgent Action and Early Warning Procedures. 12 February 2013

21 February 2013

Access to Justice Legal Empowerment Supply Chains and Trade Human Rights Self Determination and FPIC English

Durban COP 17: UNFCCC fudges decision on climate finance and makes little progress on REDD+ safeguard implementation

20 February 2012

Climate and forest policy and finance Law and Policy Reform Global Finance Climate Change English

Suriname: Association of Saramaka Authorites and FPP Request to UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination under the Urgent Action and Early Warning procedures, January 2012

22 January 2012

Access to Justice Legal Empowerment Conservation and human rights Human Rights Self Determination and FPIC English

Inter-American Court of Human Rights adopts compliance orders in the Saramaka People v. Suriname case, 23 Nov 2011

13 January 2012

Conservation and human rights Access to Justice English

Lessons from the field: REDD+ and the rights of indigenous peoples and forest dependent communities

25 November 2011

Climate and forest policy and finance Global Finance English

Letter submitted by the Saramaka people to the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) expressing serious concern about the compatibility of IADB projects in Suriname as these relate to the judgment of the I-A Court in Saramaka People v. Suriname

20 September 2010

Access to Justice English

Case of the Saramaka people v. Suriname Order of the President of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights

05 April 2010

Conservation and human rights English

Show cookie settings