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Inter-agency cooperation on minority issues can be established at the national, regional and global levels. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) coordinates the UN Inter-Agency Group on Minorities in Geneva. In Nepal, for example, a Social Inclusion Action Group (SIAG) is a multi-agency forum of donor agencies (including UNDP) and civil society organizations with the purpose of promoting inclusion in policy and practice through advocacy work, learning events, and information sharing. This group helps to bring about changes within participating organizations, and positively influences government and civil society on social inclusion issues. The SIAG is focusing on issues such as workforce diversity and monitoring systems. It is conducting a workforce diversity survey of donor agencies, sharing methodologies for mapping the disadvantaged groups in Nepal and working on developing a social inclusion index. In Ecuador, the UNCT created the Inter-Agency Working Group on Intercultural Issues to coordinate activities impacting principally on marginalised Afro-descendants and Indigenous Peoples (see Box 20).
At the operative level, the United Nations system in Ecuador established an inter-agency coordination mechanism, based on the concept of a lead agency for each one of the MDGs and the related themes contained in the Millennium Declaration. One of the mechanisms of this coordination process is the creation of the thematic Inter-Agency Working Groups (IAWG), which was created in 2005. The IAWGs were requested to integrate the principles of “Action 2”35, as well as an intercultural and gender approach, into the definition of their policies and initiatives.
In particular, an Inter-Agency Working Group on Intercultural Issues was established, led by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), to coordinate themes related to indigenous peoples and Afro-descendants.
Some of the activities carried out by the IAWG on Intercultural Issues included:
- Drafting a common policy on intercultural issues for the UN system in Ecuador.
- Conducting annual preparatory workshops for the participation of indigenous peoples in the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.
- Publishing a report on the MDGs and Afro-descendants36 (a report on the MDGs and indigenous peoples also will be published).
- Drafting and presenting annual activity reports to the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.
- Publishing the periodical IAWG Information Bulletin.
- Conducting a preparatory workshop for the participation of Afro-descendants in the UN Durban Review Conference 2009, which was a follow up to the 2001 UN World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance.
- Attempts to create a mechanism of consultation with indigenous peoples (a “Permanent Consultative and Advisory Council of the United Nations and the Indigenous Organizations, Nationalities and Peoples”).
- Implementing a first large-scale Joint Programme (“Development and cultural diversity for the reduction of poverty and social inclusion programme”) presented by the member agencies of the IAWG
(8 UN agencies) to the UNDP-Spain MDG Achievement Fund, under the Thematic Window on “Culture and Development”. The total three-year budget is US$ 5,500,000.
- Supporting several UN Special Procedure
visits to the country, including the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous peoples, and the Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent. In the case of other UN Special Procedure missions to Ecuador, intercultural issues have been included as a cross-cutting issue, facilitated by field visits to communities, meetings with ethnic groups and with state bodies responsible for human rights and public policies related to ethnic groups.
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