Human rights and indigenous peoples in the Arctic: What are the implications for the oil and gas industry?

There are about 300 million indigenous people in the world today, representing more than 4000 different languages in more than 70 countries (United Nations Human Development Report; UNHDR, 2004: 29).1 One and a half million of these people live in the Arctic region where indigenous people represent 15 per cent of the total population (compared with 1.5 per cent in the entire world). This is a common trait throughout the circumpolar world, although the proportion of indigenous peoples does vary considerably. In some places, indigenous peoples are in an absolute majority,2 while in other parts of the Arctic, they represent a small minority.3 The adoption of the Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples by the United Nations General Assembly in September 2007, while of obvious global significance, is of particular importance in the Arctic and to the four Arctic states considered in this volume.