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Thank you, Chair, for giving Norway the floor. We also thank the HLPE-FSN for this important report.
Distinguished delegates,
Indigenous Peoples’ food and knowledge systems offer valuable lessons for building more sustainable, diverse and resilient food systems. Rooted in relationships with lands, territories, waters, and biodiversity, these systems support food security, nutrition, cultural identity, and environmental stewardship.
Yet, as the report highlights, these systems face growing pressures from biodiversity loss, climate change impacts, dispossession and the erosion of traditional knowledge. Protecting them is therefore not only a matter of sustainability, but also of human rights and justice.
Norway emphasizes that policies affecting Indigenous Peoples' food and knowledge systems must be guided by the right to adequate food and consistent with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
This requires respecting Indigenous Peoples’ rights to lands, territories and resources, their self-determination and their own institutions and governance systems. It also requires respecting Indigenous Peoples right to be consulted in order to obtain their the principle of free, prior and informed consent in accordance with UNDRIP.
Indigenous knowledge must be valued on its own terms, with safeguards against unauthorized access, use and appropriation. Indigenous Peoples should be recognized not simply as beneficiaries or sources of knowledge, but as rights holders and decision-makers in shaping food-security, biodiversity and climate policies.
We must also respect the diversity of Indigenous Peoples’ food systems and support locally appropriate, Indigenous-led solutions, including the transmission of knowledge across generations.
In conclusion, Norway encourages CFS to build on this report through an inclusive, rights-based process that places Indigenous Peoples and their institutions at the center of future policy discussions.
Thank you, Chair.