French Guiana is an overseas department and region of France in South America. Although France has adopted the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, French Guiana’s 10,000 indigenous inhabitants are facing a number of challenges, especially in relation to illegal gold mining affecting the natural habitats and the local populations who depend on those habitats.
French Guiana is a French overseas territory located in South America. It shares a border to the west with Suriname, along the Maroni River, and to the east with Brazil along the Oyapock River. Although France has adopted the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, French Guiana’s 10,000 Indigenous inhabitants are facing a number of challenges, especially in relation to illegal gold mining affecting the natural habitats and the local populations who depend on those habitats.
France has not ratified ILO Convention 169, an international legal instrument dealing specifically with the rights of Indigenous and tribal peoples. France only recognises Areas of Collective Land Use Rights, concessions and transfers, which cover 8% of the area of French Guiana and give only a simple right to use of the land.
Indigenous Peoples in French Guiana
The French Constitution prohibits ethnic statistics. According to researchers’ estimates, its Indigenous Peoples make up some 4% of Guiana’s population, or more than 10,000 individuals. Six Indigenous communities survived colonisation: the Kali’na Tileuyu, Lokono and Pahikweneh who live on the coast near the urban centres and the Wayãpi, Teko and Wayana people who live in isolated territories in the headwaters of the Oyapock and Maroni rivers.
The Pahikweneh, the Lokono, and the Téleuyu peoples live along the coast between Saint Laurent du Maroni and Saint Georges de l’Oyapock. The Wayampi and the Teko peoples live in the Upper Oyapock, and the Wayana peoples, plus a few Teko and Apalaï, in the Upper Maroni. Their traditional practices of fishing, hunting, gathering, and slash-and-burn agriculture have become increasingly difficult due to numerous regulations and mining activities.
France has recognised regional languages since 1992, and there has been academic provision for mother-tongue teachers since 1998.
Main challenges of French Guiana’s Indigenous Peoples
One of the main struggles of Indigenous Peoples in French Guiana relates to the consequences of illegal gold mining, which affects natural habitats and the local populations that depend on those habitats. Especially, the Guiana Amazonian Park (PAG) has experienced an increase in illegal gold mining sites in recent years.
Wild game is increasingly rare, as forest and river environments are being polluted and destroyed, and the local populations experience significant health problems and related social consequences, such as insecurity, illegal trafficking, prostitution, and violence, among other issues.
Another struggle relates to the forced evangelisation of the Indigenous populations of South America, which has considerably grown in scale in French Guiana during recent years. The evangelisation practices promote different values rather than the respect for traditional, particularly shamanic, beliefs and they encourage changes in the traditional way of life of the Amerindians, as for example, to stop drinking the traditional drink cachiri and to no longer practise their artisanal and ceremonial activities.
During the social protests in French Guiana between March and April 2017, on 2 April, the Minister for Overseas France signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Indigenous and Bush- inenge peoples in which the government made 20 commitments. These included the return of 400,000 hectares of land to the Am- erindian peoples, and a referral to the Council of State to consider the constitutionality of ILO Convention 169. This Memorandum of Understanding is included in the French Guiana Agreements of 21 April 2017. No land has been returned to date, however.
Representatives of French Guiana’s Indigenous organisations, associations and networks continue to make their voices heard and denounce the recurrent problems affecting Indigenous men and women in the country.
On the edge of French territory, in north-western Guiana, the Indigenous Kali’na village of Atopo W+p+ is resisting to safeguard its territory against a power plant. In violation of Indigenous rights, the French state ceded part of their lands to HDF Energy company and mobilised a large number of armed gendarmes to carry out the project. The Kali’nas warriors maintain a strong opposition and are urging for the plant to be relocated.
French Guiana is a French overseas territory located in South America. It shares a border to the west with Suriname, along the Maroni River, and to the east with Brazil along the Oyapock River. It covers an area of 83,846 km2. The population numbers 268,700 inhabitants (INSEE, 2017) who live mainly in the capital of Cayenne and along the coast. The interior of the country is covered with dense equatorial forest and is only accessible by plane or canoe.
French Guiana officially became a colony of France in 1604. France applied the principle of “terra nullius” to appropriate the lands of the Indigenous Peoples. Since 1946, French Guiana is no longer a colony but remains administered by France. More than 90% of Guiana’s territory is owned by the French government.
Guiana is an overseas department and region of France in South America. It is bordered to the west by Suriname and the south and east by Brazil. It has a population of 259,865 inhabitants (INSEE, 2015). The interior of the country (90% of the land mass) is covered by dense equatorial forest that is only accessible by plane or canoe along the Maroni River from the west or the Oyapock River from the south-east.
French Guiana is a French overseas territory located in the eastern Amazon, in South America. It shares a border to the west with Suriname, and to the east and south with Brazil. The area of the territory is 83,846 km². The population is estimated at 301,099 inhabitants (INSEE, 2023) living mainly in the capital of Cayenne and along the coast. More than 90% of the territory is covered by a dense equatorial forest representing 1% of the Amazon rainforest. The interior of the country is only accessible by plane or by canoe.
French Guiana is an overseas department and region of France in South America. It is bordered to the west by Suriname and to the south and east by Brazil. It has a population of 268,700 inhabitants (INSEE, 2017). The interior of the country is covered by dense equatorial forest that is only accessible by plane or canoe along the Maroni River to the west or the Oyapock River to the south-east. Ninety (90) per cent of the territory is owned by the French state, under the system of “terra nullius” that was applied during the colonial era, to the detriment of the Indigenous Peoples who were dispossessed of their lands.
IWGIA - International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs - is a global human rights organisation dedicated to promoting and defending Indigenous Peoples’ rights. Read more.
