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The links between customary law practice and supervision by human rights watchdog bod- ies and formal courts of law are often weak, misunderstood or tense. There is a general need to
increase synergy between and among watchdog bodies and indigenous peoples’ institutions and share responsibilities.
The UNDRIP makes it clear, especially in Article 34, that customary law must conform to international human rights standards.
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AIPP Regional Capacity Building Program - Training Manual on the UNDRIP
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RIGHTS AIPP
AIPP Regional Capacity Building Program - Training Manual on the UNDRIP
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Land, Territory and Resources
Prepared by Christian Erni Module 4
OBJECTIVES
1. To understand why land and other natural resources are extremely important for indigenous peoples;
2. To gain an overview of the existing problems in having the land and resource rights of indig- enous peoples formally recognized, especially in our own countries;
3. To gain an overview of key issues related to the management and conservation of land and resources by indigenous peoples;
4. To know the provisions in the UNDRIP that address indigenous peoples’ rights to land, territo- ry and resources, and to the autonomous management, conservation and development of these;
5. To reflect on the extent to which indigenous peoples’ rights to land, territory and resources, as enshrined in the UNDRIP, are upheld in our own countries;
6. To learn about good examples of how indigenous peoples assert rights to land, territory and resources;
7. To envision a better future with respect to our own communities’ rights to land, territory and resources, to identify the challenges in achieving this, and to identify the means by which the
challenges can be addressed.
CONTENTS
I. INTRODUCTION A. Indigenous peoples’ relationship to land, territory and resources
1. The multi-dimensional relationship of indigenous peoples to land 2. The consequences of land loss
B. Indigenous peoples’ rights to land, territory and resources 1. Non-recognition by the state
2. Indigenous peoples’ customary law and state law C. Optional Section Indigenous peoples’ systems of resource management and conserva-
tion
II. UNDRIP PROVISIONS ON RIGHTS TO LAND, TERRITORY AND RESOURCES A. Core articles: overall recognition of rights to land, territory and resources
B. Related articles: 1. On the recognition of customary laws regulating rights to land and resources
2. On the right to an easily-accessible, fair, inclusive and expeditious mechanism of re- dress for past injustices
3.On the right to means of subsistence and to development
4.On the recognition of indigenous peoples’ conservation and protection of the environ- ment
5.On land, territory, resources and the right to self-determination
Module-4
RIGHTS AIPP
AIPP Regional Capacity Building Program - Training Manual on the UNDRIP
III. REALITIES ON THE GROUND A. How rights to land, territory and resources are respected or violated
B. Laws and policies, good and bad, pertaining to the recognition of rights to land, territory and resources
C. Challenges in having good laws and policies implemented D. Challenges in resisting or preventing the implementation of bad laws and policies
IV. EXPERIENCES AND LESSONS LEARNED A. Actual practice or exercise of land-resource rights within the existing framework of na-
tional laws and policies B. Advocacy and lobby at national and international levels
C. Assertive action and mobilization at national and international levels
V. CHALLENGES
I. INTRODUCTION
A. Indigenous Peoples’ Relaionship to Land and Territory
1. The multi-dimensional relationship of indigenous peoples to land
In a report to the UN Commission on Hu- man Rights, Special Rapporteur Erica Irene
A. Daes summarized four elements that are unique to indigenous peoples:
• A profound relationship exists between indigenous peoples and their lands, terri-
tories and resources; • This relationship has various social, cul-
tural, spiritual, economic and political di- mensions and responsibilities;
• The collective dimension of this rela-
tionship is significant; and • The intergenerational aspect of such a
relationship is also crucial to indigenous peoples’ identity, survival and cultural vi-
ability.
What distinguishes indigenous peoples’ relationship to land from that of many other peoples is its multi-dimensional character:
a. Land is the basis of livelihood.
Indigenous peoples live in almost all major biomes of the world, from the high arctic to the tropical rainforest. Over centuries or even millennia, indigenous peoples have developed sophis-
ticated and well-adapted forms of land and resource use that provide their communities with what they need to make a living.
Pose the following questions, written on cards and distributed to participants:
• In your own experience, how have indigenous peoples been able to hold
on to their lands, territories and re- sources?
• What are the main threats and problems encountered by indigenous
peoples in relation to land, territory and resources?
• What do you think are the rights of indigenous peoples related to land,
territory and resources?
Collect and cluster the written replies, and synthesize the ideas of the participants.
Input the content below, showing photos and other visual material. At points in-
dicated below, engage the participants in group interaction.
Suggested Method
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RIGHTS AIPP
AIPP Regional Capacity Building Program - Training Manual on the UNDRIP
69 EXAMPLES OF INDIGENOUS LIVELIHOOD SYSTEMS:
• Hunting and fishing in the arctic and sub-arctic; • Transhumant nomadic pastoralism in the deserts and semi-deserts of Africa,
and of West and Central Asia; • Shifting cultivation in the tropics and sub-tropics of South and Central America,
Africa, and South and Southeast Asia; • Intensive agriculture, like wet-rice cultivation in South and Southeast Asia, or corn
production in North and Central America.
In most cases, indigenous communities combine their main or pivotal form of land use with several other forms of land-resource use. For example, shifting cultivators in Southeast Asia usu-
ally combine swidden agriculture with animal husbandry they keep pigs, chicken, cattle, buffalo, horses etc., hunting and gathering, fishing, cultivation of cash crops like rubber, coffee, tea,
spices and seasonal off-farm employment.
Most indigenous people are still largely de- pendent on land and natural resources for their
livelihood, even though an increasing number of the youth are seeking employment outside their
communities.
b. The relationship of indigenous peoples to the land goes beyond economics; it has a social and
cultural dimension.
The social organisation of indigenous peo- ples is reflected in the way the community regu-
lates access to land and resources.
The Tangkhul Naga of Northeast India, for ex- ample, distinguish between land over which individuals have use rights, land that belongs to a
clan, and land that belongs to the whole village. There are clear regulations on the use of each type of land.
Land use and ownership rights are defined similarly among
the Kalinga of the Northern Luzon Cordillera in the Philippines, who
differentiate between: 1 rice fields owned by individuals; 2
swidden land used by individuals but owned by the village; 3 pas-
ture and forest land owned by the entire tribe, whose territory may
consist of several villages.
A village identifies strongly with its land, and so does the indi-
vidual who has inherited a paddy field from an ancestor.
Simpliied diagram of a Kalinga tribe’s bugis territory and consituent il-ili villages by Rafael Marcus Bangit
The Upper Fay Valley in the Buhid Ancestral Domain, Mindoro, Phil- ippines. Photo by Chrisian Erni
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