Posts Tagged ‘indigenous rights’
Indigenous Peoples in Isolation in Colombia: A recent history of the challenges involved in their protection
Since the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, there were rumors from rubber and animal skin traders about the presence of peoples who took shelter deep in the adjoining forests. These are peoples who avoid all forms of contact with the surrounding society.
Read MoreThe Healing Bees of the Amazon Forest
Ancient human societies were not the first to discover the power of plants for healing: for millions of years, bees have used botanical resin exudates—known as propolis—to control the proliferation of microorganisms in their nests. These Amazonian bees possess innate knowledge of medicinal plants. By collecting resin from different trees and plants, they produce one of the first medicine cocktail of animals’ societies, known as propolis. ACT has been strengthening the communities living in the Amazon forest in order to sustainably harvest this product.
Read MoreFor the first time, Colombian Constitutional Court rulings are being translated into indigenous languages
The Amazon Conservation Team and the Colombian Constitutional Court have joined forces to culturally and idiomatically interpret the most significant rulings of the Colombian Constitutional Court with respect to the protection of the nation’s ethnic communities. In a first project phase, the partners and indigenous community members adapted these rulings to 26 of the nation’s 65 languages.
Read MoreStrengthening Indigenous Land Rights in Colombia
In Santa Marta, Colombia, earlier this year, preparations began for a series of expeditions into the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. More than a dozen teams—each composed of indigenous peoples and western professionals—prepared their gear for weeks-long trips into the remote mountains.
Read MoreACT Indigenous Fellowship Program
The Amazon Conservation Team (ACT) has established an Indigenous Fellowship Program in partnership with Colombia’s Universidad Externado to provide indigenous college students with the opportunity to better understand the functioning of international cooperation agencies, international conventions, and funding aimed at supporting the rights of indigenous communities.
Read MoreOral Histories: Helping the Kogui Manage their Territory
Two of ACT’s objectives in our work at Jaba Tañiwashkaka, a coastal sacred site of the indigenous peoples of Colombia’s Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta region, are to increase the territorial management capacity of indigenous leadership and to establish conservation agreements between the local indigenous and non-indigenous communities. In contexts like the Sierra Nevada de…
Read MoreWhat is the correlation between the protection of indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation and the protection of the Amazon?
Let’s start with a question. If you lived in South America, and had to run away from society, where would you hide? The most remote areas of the Amazon, where thousands of small rivers are born and eventually become giant waterways—which along the way irrigate millions of trees, and in their final destination feed the…
Read MoreThe River School: Indigenous Communities Learning & Working Together for the Protection of Key Ecosystems in Colombia
Throughout ACT’s more than 20 years of conservation and indigenous rights work in South America, one of the greatest challenges our partner communities voice is the gaining of effective control over their territories. Conspicuously, many countries have legal means through which local autonomy can be achieved, but the communities still need the basic skills necessary…
Read MoreColombian Government Approves Decree for the Protection of Isolated Indigenous Groups
On July 17, 2018, the Colombian government approved a landmark national public policy for the protection of isolated indigenous groups. The policy was developed in a collaboration led by the Colombian Ministry of the Interior with the participation of governmental entities and local and regional indigenous organizations, supported by technical and legal assistance from the nonprofit Amazon Conservation Team (ACT). his groundbreaking national public policy was the first in the Amazon region directly led by the grassroots efforts of neighboring indigenous communities and indigenous organizations undergoing a process of free prior informed consent according to international regulations, thus resulting in an unprecedented integration of traditional spiritual worldviews in modern environmental protection strategies.
Read MoreACT and Opiac Participate in Second International Meeting on “Perspectives on Protection Policies for Indigenous Peoples in Isolation and Initial Contact”
The second international meeting on “Perspectives on Protection Policies for Indigenous Peoples in Isolation and Initial Contact”, held in Brazil, was successfully completed. The Colombia delegation consisted of Robinson Lopez, Human Rights and Peace Coordinator for the National Organization of the Indigenous Peoples of the Colombian Amazon (OPIAC); Oswaldo Silva, a leader of the Curare – Los Ingleses Indigenous Reserve of the Amazonas department; and Daniel Aristizábal of the Amazon Conservation Team (ACT), who presented a paper on the prior consultation process for a proposed decree for the prevention of risks to and the protection of the rights of indigenous peoples in isolation of Colombia.
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