United Nations, Apr 23 (UNI) Traditional knowledge is at the core of indigenous identity, culture and heritage around the world, the chair of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues said at the annual event’s opening day on Monday, stressing that it “must be protected”.
Anne Nuorgam, who is a member of Finland’s Saami Parliament and head of the Saami Council’s Human Rights Unit, described the Forum as an opportunity to share innovations and practices, developed in indigenous communities “over centuries and millennia”.
Indigenous peoples make up less than six per cent of the world’s population, but account for 15 per cent of the poorest on earth, according to the Forum. They live in some 90 countries, represent 5,000 different cultures and speak the overwhelming majority of the world’s estimated 6,700 languages.