Natural resource management and Indigenous food systems in Northern Ontario

Abstract

The forests and freshwaters of Northern Ontario are complex socio-ecological systems that have provided opportunities to sustain local lives, economies, and cultures since time immemorial. Through nation-to-nation agreements, Indigenous nations ceded land title to the Crown through treaties in which the Crown promised them enhanced livelihood. The treaties articulated the rights of each party to share access to these lands, and the Canadian courts continue to describe the nature and extent of the rights of each party as well as their duties and responsibilities. Despite great developments in Canadian society, descendants of the Indigenous treaty signatories have experienced disproportionately high rates of unemployment, negative health outcomes, low education rates, and increased food insecurity. The legislative framework guiding Crown land management in Ontario is strongly rooted in Canada’s colonial past; thus the Indigenous land user’s access to foods is largely disassociated from the perspective of the Crown land manager. This research explores assumptions associated with Crown forest management in Ontario based on the purposes of the Crown Forest Sustainability Act, with specific objectives linking participant action research with independent thesis-action research. Community-based research priorities are reflected in in each chapter within the context of Indigenous food systems and natural resource management in Northern Ontario. The major findings of this research confirm that if meeting social, economic, and environmental needs of present and future generations is the purpose of Crown forest management, then based on experiences of Indigenous land users, the paradigm in which natural resource management occurs should be re-evaluated. The researcher provides recommendations for forest managers, including shifting the current knowledge paradigm from the primarily quantitative approach to a more holistic paradigm that includes qualitative information. To achieve this recommendation, the need to reform required training for forest management authorities, to include Indigenous worldviews as well as Aboriginal and Treaty Rights. Furthermore, in order to meet the needs of Indigenous land users, the natural resource management paradigm should be expanded to include food system management. Finally, lessons learned from the research project are presented as the 4Rs for rebuilding food sovereignty: reclaim, reorganize, re-skill, and restore.