Takeaways: IIPWG January 2025
Items excerpted from the January 2025 Investors & Indigenous Peoples Working Group (IIPWG) Newsletter. The next IIPWG strategy call takes place Thursday, February 20, 11:00 am ET. Learn more about IIPWG.
Strategy Discussion: Corporate Policy Commitments to UNDRIP and FPIC
IIPWG participants discussed corporate policy commitments to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and free, prior and informed consent (FPIC). For investors engaging companies to adopt such commitments, participants recommended drawing on evolving case law, requesting greater corporate transparency, and referencing specific articles of the UNDRIP.
Participants also discussed existing corporate commitments, including requisite FPIC trainings for leadership at Agnico Eagle [NYSE: AEM; TSX:AEM], commitment to FPIC as an ongoing process by Kinross Gold [NYSE: KGC; TSX:K], and adherence to ILO 169 and UNDRIP principles on engagement with Indigenous Peoples by ConocoPhillips [NYSE: COP]. While more comprehensive policies and practices are needed to align with the UNDRIP, these examples include noteworthy elements. Participants went on to highlight the risk gap investors face given states’ shortcomings in implementing the UNDRIP and protecting Indigenous Peoples up to the international standard of UNDRIP.
If you are aware of additional corporate policy commitments on UNDRIP, FPIC, or Indigenous Peoples’ rights that would be helpful to share within IIPWG, please email AnnaMae Dziallo at AnnaMae@tallgrassinstitute.org. A recording of the strategy call is available upon request.
Gwich’in Nation Celebrates No Bids at Second Mandated Arctic Refuge O&G Lease Sale
On January 8, the U.S.’s second legally mandated oil and gas lease sale of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge received no bids. The Gwich’in Steering Committee (GSC), formed by the Gwich’in Nation in 1988 to protect sacred land in the Arctic Refuge, said in a statement: “A second failed lease sale in the Arctic Refuge also clearly demonstrates that even oil companies recognize what we have known all along: drilling in the Arctic Refuge is not worth the economic risk and liability that results from development on sacred lands without the consent of Indigenous Peoples.”
Following the GSC’s advocacy after the 2017 Tax and Jobs Act mandated the lease sales, nearly 30 global banks and 20 international insurers instituted policy to decline underwriting oil and gas projects in the Refuge. The GSC has called for permanent protections for Iizhik Gwats'an Gwandaii Goodlit (“The Sacred Place Where Life Begins”).
Despite Commitment to the UNDRIP, GM Invests in Thacker Pass Lithium Mine
General Motors [NYSE: GM] entered into a joint venture with Lithium Americas [NYSE: LAC], investing $625 million into the Thacker Pass lithium mine for a 38% stake in the project. Thacker Pass – the sacred site of Peehee Mu’huh, which means “Rotten Moon” in Paiute – holds great cultural, spiritual, and historical significance for Tribes with thousands of artifacts and cultural sites and as the location of two massacres.
This deal proceeded in December 2024 despite the lack of FPIC obtained for the mine, which undermines GM’s commitment to the UNDRIP in its Human Rights Policy and commitment to respect Indigenous Peoples’ right to FPIC in its Supplier Code of Conduct.