Knowing our Lands and Resources: Indigenous and Local Knowledge of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services in Africa

Introduction

The Intergovernmental Platform for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) includes as one of its operating principles the following commitment:

Recognize and respect the contribution of indigenous and local knowledge to the

conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity and ecosystems.

                                               UNEP/IPBES.MI/2/9, Appendix 1, para. 2 (d)

To spearhead its work on this challenging objective, IPBES Plenary created at its Second Meeting the Task Force on Indigenous and Local Knowledge (ILK) Systems.

The present document is a contribution to the IPBES regional assessment for Africa. Its aim is twofold:

To assist the co-chairs, coordinating lead authors and lead authors of the regional assessment

for Africa by facilitating their access to indigenous and local knowledge relevant to the

assessment theme.

To pilot the initial approaches and procedures for building ILK into IPBES assessments that

are under development by the ILK task force in order to test their efficacy and improve the

final ILK approaches and procedures that the task force will propose to the Plenary of IPBES.

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