Brasilia, October 25, 2024 - The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) formalised a new strategic partnership during a meeting held in Brasilia-DF, consolidating joint efforts to strengthen indigenous territorial protection in the Amazon. The project “Surveillance, Preparedness and Response System for Indigenous Territorial Protection in the Brazilian Amazon” implemented by UNODC is part of the global program “Preparedness and Early Action to Protect Yanomami Indigenous Communities from Social and Natural Disasters”, a UNICEF cooperation with ECHO. This initiative seeks to integrate technical and indigenous knowledge, promoting and strengthening integration between indigenous communities and government agencies.

The project aims to strengthen monitoring and response systems for territorial protection in the Amazon, ensuring the participation of indigenous communities and integration with government systems at national and sub-national levels. Among the actions planned are training workshops on territorial protection and the prevention of crimes affecting the environment, such as deforestation and illegal mining, national and international exchanges, the construction of a monitoring and surveillance room in Munduruku territory and the acquisition of equipment for indigenous associations and organizations.

The UNODC representative in Brazil, Elena Abbati, emphasised the importance of this cooperation, stressing that the union of mandates and expertise of the two agencies strengthens not only the response to the needs of vulnerable populations, but also the prevention and response to environmental crimes and other illicit activities that threaten the sustainable development of the region. The meeting was attended by UNICEF's representative in Brazil, Youssouf Abdel-Jelil, UNICEF's Deputy Representative in Brazil, Layla Saad, and the agency's experts, Gregory Bulit, emergencies coordinator, Vanessa Wirth, head of protection against violence, and Yuri dos Santos Silva, executive associate of the representation.

Also present were UNODC experts, the executive management officer (Ana Paula Penante), the coordinator of the environmental crime prevention unit (Alexander Walsh), the UNODC-UNICEF project manager ( Elisangela Sousa) and the coordinator of the Tapajós Project (Marcela Ulhoa). The cooperation seeks to ensure that the local and community knowledge of indigenous peoples is the basis for structuring responses to threats.

SAR-TI - SAR-TI is an initiative of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MAECI) of the Government of Italy. Its aim is to support and foster the articulation of indigenous associations and organizations, government institutions and civil society to structure, strengthen and integrate mechanisms for preparation, monitoring, early warning and responding to environmental and other crimes in indigenous territories, with a focus on areas affected by illegal gold mining in the Amazon.