Equalizing the Encounter-Free Prior Informed Consent

Free prior and informed consent (FPIC) is a self-determination-based Collective Right of Indigenous peoples to give or withhold their consent to activities or measures impacting on their lands, territories, or resources. There cannot be any manipulation or coercion; decisions must obtain consent in advance, peoples must receive full information, and indigenous peoples must be free to exercise their own decision-making processes. While 5 percent of the global population is constituted of indigenous peoples, 50 percent of the world’s remaining resources are located in their lands. This has been guaranteed since the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People in 2007.