The International Alliance has been involved in, and monitoring, the work of the United Nations Forum on Forests for a number of years, in close coordination with the Global Forest Coalition and the Forest Peoples Programme. In 2002 the International Alliance was nominated the indigenous peoples' focal point for the Multi-Stakeholder Dialogue in the UNFF process, about which further information is available from the ITS. Prior to the UNFF process, the International Alliance has also been involved in the Intergovernmental Panel on Forests, and the Intergovernmental Forum on Forests which followed it. During this period the International Alliance co-hosted a meeting in Leticia, Colombia, to provide concrete recommendations to the IFF on 'Proposals for Action'. In 2004 the International Alliance followed this with the Expert Meeting on Traditional Forest Related Knowledge and the Implementation of Related International Commitments, held in Costa Rica in December. Full information about this meeting is available here.

5th Session of the UNFF

As in 2004, the International Alliance will be attending the 5th Session of the United Nations Forum on Forsts, to be held in New York in May 2005. The Alliance has recently submitted an indigenous peoples' discussion paper for the 5th Session discussions, and would welcome comments on this text.

There will also be a side-event held during the course of the 5th Session entitled Indigenous Peoples, Human Rights and the Furture International Arrangement(s) on Forests. Further details of the side-event will be posted as they become available.

4th Session of the UNFF

An International Alliance delegation attended the 4th session of the UNFF in Geneva in May to lobby governments on two agenda items of fundamental importance for indigenous peoples: The Social and Cultural Aspects of Forests and Traditional Forest Related Knowledge (TFRK). However, ultimately the resolution on The Social and Cultural Aspects of Forests was very general, including little direct support for IPs, and the TFRK accord was discarded because consensus among governments could not be reached. But, a significant step was taken by indigenous peoples, who were given the opportunity to make a direct intervention during language negotiations, having successfully lobbied the G7 and China, the first time this has been possible in the history of the UNFF! For more information concerning the outcomes of the UNFF, please visit their website www.un.org/esa/forests. A report of UNFF4 was put together by the Forest Peoples Programme and FERN www.forestpeoples.org and is available from the ITS.

Below are statements and a document that the Alliance prepared and contributed to the session.