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Human Rights & Indigenous Peoples
UNFPA recognizes the universality and indivisibility
of human rights, and emphasizes a rights-based approach to population
and development with a focus on meeting individual needs and rights.
UNFPA supports policies and programmes, including advocacy, training
and the provision of information on human rights relating to reproductive
health and gender mainstreaming.
UNFPA collaborates actively with partners, members
of all six human rights bodies, representatives from the United
Nations agencies and bodies, and from non-governmental organizations,
to continuously assess the progress, obstacles and opportunities
for integrating health and reproductive rights into the work of
the treaty bodies. This will also assist in further implementation
of treaty obligations at national, regional and interregional
levels.
UNFPA emphasizes the importance of cultural
values and their linkages with population and development, including
democracy and good governance, as well as with human rights in
all policies and programmes. UNFPA stresses the need to respect
cultural values in the design and implementation of its assistance
to activities and in its partnership with key national and international
institutions.
UNFPA supports initiatives to address the special
needs of indigenous peoples. At country level programme activities
may include the development of quality and culturally sensitive
reproductive health information and education services, with the
full participation of indigenous peoples, that responds to their
needs and respect their rights. At the regional and global levels,
UNFPA contributes actively to the process for establishing a Permanent
Forum for Indigenous Issues, per ECOSOC resolution to serve as
an advisory body to the Council, with a mandate to discuss issues
relating to indigenous peoples everywhere.
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UNFPA has been supporting initiatives
and programmes to address the special needs of indigenous
peoples, through developing quality, culturally-sensitive
reproductive health information, and education programmes
and services that respond to the needs of indigenous
peoples and with their full participation. More specifically,
UNFPA funds national and regional projects responding
specifically to the needs of indigenous peoples, in
particular in Latin America and the Caribbean region.
These projects focus on improving access of indigenous
peoples to primary health-care centres and to improving
the quality of the reproductive healthcare received.
The projects take into account the importance of cultural
values for quality of care and include training and
counselling components for health workers, as well
as the provision of reproductive health equipment
and contraceptives.
UNFPA has been funding reproductive
health-related programmes for indigenous peoples since
the early 1990s, and efforts have increased through
the provision of bi-literacy programmes. These programmes
which involve providing literacy training in both
the native language of the participants and Spanish
- the official language of the country - are also
excellent vehicles for transmitting information on
reproductive health and gender issues to mostly illiterate
indigenous peoples, as well as to non-indigenous communities,
including community leaders, policy-makers, social
and health workers and the media. UNFPA has been supporting
such programmes in Bolivia, Guatemala, Mexico and
Peru. UNFPA has also funded the production of a prize-winning
documentary film on the bi-literacy programme in Peru,
called “Así es esta historia”.
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