The BARKA Foundation » UN

Indigenous Peoples Rights and Sustainable Development

arthur — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 19:27:22 +0000

There are an estimated 370 million indigenous peoples in the world in over 90 countries. The lands that indigenous communities live on and the resources that surround them are central to their faith, way of life, and cultural, spiritual, ancestral and intellectual traditions.

As developing countries work to augment their economic growth and corporations continue to search for resources, the lands, and subsequently the way of life, of indigenous peoples are at risk.

Traditional Dance in Tantiaka

One crucial aspect of the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/en/drip.html), or UNDRIP, is the right of indigenous communities to free, prior and informed consent (FPIC). This right requires that states gain the free prior and informed consent of indigenous peoples before public or private institutions take actions that may affect the lands, resources, intellectual property and cultural and spiritual practices of indigenous populations.

Governments have agreed to follow each individual aspect of FPIC:

Free – decisions must be allowed without coercion or force of indigenous peoples

Prior- ample time allotted to communities before final decision

Informed – the nature and duration of the project, the areas that will be affected and other necessary, unbiased information are all provided to indigenous peoples in a language and form that can be understood by the community

Consent – explicit agreement of indigenous people to allow the project

Despite UNDRIP and agreements from states, governments often ignore FPIC and other rights in UNDRIP. Due to a variety of economic concerns governments and corporations forcibly strip land and resources from indigenous peoples. The international community, especially countries that are home to indigenous populations, and proponents of sustainable development have a duty to find the neglect of indigenous rights unacceptable and counterproductive to the true nature of progress.

From the beginning, the BARKA Foundation has committed to an approach to sustainable development that respects, preserves and involves indigenous peoples and cultures. What community-led development means for BARKA is working with a community to identify its needs and partnering with that community to find and implement sustainable solutions. All of BARKA’s development projects are planned and carried out with a deep respect for indigenous culture and the direct consultation, consent and participation of the villagers of Tantiaka in Burkina Faso.

Young girl retrieving water for her family

In October, BARKA will go to Burkina Faso to continue work to address what villagers determined to be their most pressing need: clean water. BARKA’s partnership with Tantiaka started with water, and it will continue with all other development projects in the small village.

The UN, through its annual Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII; http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/) continues to work towards a world where there is stronger protection for the rights of indigenous peoples. This year’s forum, held in May, established the UN Indigenous Peoples Partnership, UNIPP, which aims to support indigenous communities, increase access for indigenous leaders in the governance process and continue to strengthen indigenous rights (http://bit.ly/mPiWBV).

These UN actions and events help the fight for indigenous rights, but popular awareness of these issues and NGO support for indigenous communities are crucial as supplements to UN policy. It takes regular people and determined NGOs to pressure governments into a greater concern for indigenous rights. Even more importantly, anyone that works on global development, whether it is in government or in the nonprofit sector, must realize the essential nature of indigenous communities in efforts to pursue sustainable development.

- Arthur Tarley, BARKA UN Youth Representative

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The Youth Factor in International Development

arthur — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 18:10:07 +0000

How do youth get involved? How do NGOs and governments engage youth? How can youth realize the power that they have? These are some questions that are becoming more and more necessary and useful to explore, especially at a time when we all must commit to address climate change, sustainable development and barriers to peace.

BARKA with the Student Environment Action Committee at John Bast High School in Bangor Maine

Each year on August 12th, the UN celebrates International Youth Day. The International Year of Youth (IYY) started in August 2010 and will end August of this year. The IYY website (http://social.un.org/youthyear/) contains information about the year, related events, how youth can get involved and how the year has helped youth gain a more significant voice.

The UN program on Youth (UNPY) has created a guide describing actions youth can take to address societies problems during the International Year of Youth and beyond. The guide titled, “Activities Kit: A Guide to Celebrating the International Year of Youth” can be downloaded from (http://social.un.org/youthyear/participate.html).

The UNPY guide to getting involved is a great resource. It lays out strategies and techniques to connect and organize with others, and creates initiatives to make an impact, whether it is an impact on local business or international development.

Just some things that the UNPY guide suggests youth can do after proper organization and planning:

- Create awareness through a call to action and public service announcement video/audio

- Put together concerts or arts festivals with social messages

- Mobilize and engage with youth-led town hall meetings

- Work with local businesses to shift towards more sustainable practices

Children in Tantiaka

Youth volunteerism and community engagement on a local, national or international level is necessary in order to generate real progress in our society. Climate change, sustainable development and peace are core to our current and future existence.

These problems are especially important to young people, because these are the issues that youth will be dealing with on the world stage throughout our lives. Youth need to take a leading role to address climate change and violent conflicts to prevent future crises. Youth must realize that creating sustainable societies, lessening the effects of climate change and fostering peace in the world are issues that will continue to plague the world and humanity unless we begin to take action now.

The challenge of making an impact on policy and government behavior is a difficult one for youth; creating a strong coalition of youth that commit to addressing development, peace and the environment on an international scale will make a difference in today’s policy and, even more so, in the international policy in the near future.

Social media (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc.) can be a great way for youth to connect with other youth and link up with NGOs. It can also be an effective tool for NGOS to use to reach out to youth. Social media is just the jumping off point though; once connected, youth and adults, alike, must commit to put their common ideas into action.

Beyond engaging the communities that are near you, reaching out to political leaders and effectively using social media, to solve the pressing problems of the day it is necessary to reach out to communities and cultures across your nation and throughout the world.

The first step of development is exploring the needs of a community with the people in that community. This enables an outside group to work with that community to address these problems and work towards achieving the UN’s Millenium Development Goals (http://www.undp.org/mdg/basics.shtml).

BARKA speaking with children at Pleasantville Middle School

BARKA realizes the importance of community-led development and engaging with different communities. In the village of Tantiaka in Burkina Faso, BARKA first spoke with villagers to determine that the most pressing need of the community was access to clean water. BARKA has joined together with the community to improve villagers’ access to clean water and will continue to work with Tantiaka towards addressing Millenium Development Goals (MDGs).

One of BARKA’s initiatives in Tantiaka is the WASH in Schools program (http://www.unicef.org/wash/schools/), which places hygiene education in schools at the center of the strategy to address the community’s water and sanitation needs. Youth are of critical importance in this program, as UNICEF has found that children take the hygiene principles that they learn in school and share them with their families and wider community. And with BARKA’s water initiatives, the burden on women and girls to retrieve water will be lessened and more girls will be able to attend school.

It is important that youth and those involved in global development promote inter-cultural dialogue and respect the cultures of the communities that they work with in order enrich communities abroad and at home.

There are plenty of ways to take action, so it is up to the individual and all the youth out there to create awareness amongst friends and communities and put the time and effort towards affecting positive change. You can even get involved with BARKA’s bridge building initiatives and Walks for Water with U.S. schools, kindergarten through college. Join the conversation; tell us your ideas about youth involvement and your stories of engaging communities.

- Arthur Tarley, BARKA UN Youth Representative

Want to stay updated with BARKA’s projects and activities?

Join our Peace, Water and Wisdom Cause: http://www.causes.com/causes/274528

Like our Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-BARKA-Foundation/156328579285

And sign up for our newsletter! You can do it on the right side of this page.

Building a Team

esu — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 21:29:00 +0000

Last week was a good week. Two new people within our circle of incredible friends joined BARKA as Board members. Lynnea Bylund and Daniel Da Hien, two amazing people will help our organization in many key ways. Four new volunteers came on board, 3 of whom speak French and one of whom is Burkinabe living in the US. Today, Ali Thomson, one of BARKA’s volunteers offered her boyfriend’s services as a web developer and she stepped up as a webmistress. Without money, things are still moving. It’s as if we’re organically unfolding into the shape of an organization that will inspire the confidence of investors, potential partners and donors. In fact, even though Ina & I can’t return to Burkina yet to implement the water/sanitation/hygiene project which awaits, we are actually picking up momentum, developing a team, organizing processes in areas of fundraising, partner relations, accounting, social networking and hiring. Sanjna Katyal, a potential volunteer responded today to the open position for UN liaison- she’s perfect. Experience in development (she started a school in India), former HR Director and will be able to help us build a team and shoulder some hiring responsibilities, and of course, has experience with the UN and is already quite familiar with the UN System. It’s boggling to think about it- we have numerous volunteers and two Board members in Burkina Faso, other staffers are in the UK, France, Maine, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Florida, Minnesota, Illinois, Tennessee. Since January of this year, we have amassed a virtual team. Everyone at the moment is working together virtually to find the financial support that we know exists to advance this work forward. Last year, for the first time, when Ina & I traveled to Burkina, there was 1 person here in the US who was working with us, holding down the fort, pushing things forward, handling finances… this year there will be an entire team, both here in the US and in Burkina.