“Food is a manifestation of community and connectedness.” - Jess Hausti (Land-based educator)
Food brings comfort and stirs memory, encourages well-being, and drives tradition. It sustains income and ensures survival.
A food-secure community engages in food production, can generate a livelihood from food, offers opportunities to rebuild traditional food skills, and has full access to the land to carry out all of these. In Canada, Indigenous food security has been interfered with, even destroyed by colonization. Examples of how this has happened over hundreds of years include:
- Separating Indigenous people from their historic food systems through geographical relocation and the creation of reserves and residential schools
- Bartering Indigenous knowledge and wares for non-traditional Western foods that are highly processed
- The forced exchange of life-sustaining gardens and hunting grounds for farmland, livestock, and money.
- The collapse of bison herds and other food sources forcing Indigenous people to rely on government assistance for their wellbeing including access to and obtaining food.
- Government control over First Nations, Inuit, and Métis food cultures like the Indian Act and the the banning of potlatch ceremonies, and prohibiting First Nations purchasing or gifting of ammunition
- Introducing complicated laws and policies that to this day that break treaty promises of land use, affecting ways of sourcing food
Today, food insecurity disproportionately affects Indigenous people for several reasons, these include:
- Living in northern and remote regions of Canada whereby food arrives by plane, truck (if there are year round or winter roads), or by barge.
- Transportation of food and recent inflation increases costs in northern and remote communities by as much as 20% (El Gharib, 2022)
- The quality of fresh food that arrives in remote communities is often poor due to travel time
- The final report of the 10-year study, First Nations Food, Nutrition and Environment Study found that rates of obesity and diabetes are higher among First Nations adults compared to the general Canadian population, and 48% have difficulty putting enough food on the table. The report also comments on how industry, pollution, and climate change have affected harvesting traditional food
- Government interference with modern Indigenous livelihoods, including the fishing industry
Reclaiming Indigenous Food Traditions
“Our community knows what it needs to thrive”
Jess Hausti (Land-based educator)
A webinar hosted by The Narwhal in November 2023 focused on Indigenous food security. A panel of Indigenous knowledge keepers and land-based educators shared a variety of suggestions in which Indigenous people can reclaim Indigenous food traditions:
- Post-secondary institutions offer broad agriculture structures; however, offering agriculture competencies through short courses would better build community capacity
- Regarding how to support Indigenous food-related initiatives, communities must be asked how they want to be supported.
- Best practices first begin with small steps
- Community members must champion any large-scale food project with a sustainable vision
- Any food project must include best practices that not only seek input from community members but also seek to keep everyone informed, engaged, empowered, connected, and protected.
By reclaiming traditional food systems, Indigenous people across Canada begin to self-determine their cultural identities and health.
True North Aid seeks to fund projects that support traditional food systems, implement the above, and fund other food initiatives that bring relief to Indigenous people living in northern and remote communities.
Case Studies
Nawalakw – A small scale farm in Alert Bay, B.C.
First Nations-owned land-based fish farm in near Alert Bay recommended by Ocean Wise
Food Self Sufficiency – Kanaka Bar
Thompson River University Regenerative Agriculture Program
TRU Joins Unique Indigenous Ranching Partnership
Power move: two Anishinaabeg farmers are decolonizing Toronto’s hydro fields
References
- https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/why-food-is-so-expensive-on-first-nations-reserves/
- https://canadianfeedthechildren.ca/the-feed/food-prices-2022/
- https://globalnews.ca/news/6136161/first-nations-food-insecurity-study/
- H̓áust̓i, J. Middle Initial., McNeil, T., Wood, S. (2023, November 22). What does First Nations food sovereignty look like in the face of climate change? [Webinar]. The Narwhal. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAATd-oGsJM
