[MUSIC] Northern Indigenous communities and some First Nations in British Columbia have had success in gaining control over decision making of resource management. As described in other lessons, there are significant differences in the extent that Indigenous nations are disconnected from their land base. First Nation communities in the greater Toronto area, like the Mississaugas First Nation for example, have very different competing interests for land use in their traditional territory than remote northern communities. Remote northern regions tend to have more extractive resource development, whereas southern communities are closer to urban development. Southern communities face urban sprawl, agricultural developments and recreational land-use by non-Indigenous peoples. There are number of comprehensive land claims agreements in Canada's north. The Nunavut Land Claims Agreement that resulted in the creation of Nunavut in 1999, the Inuvialuit Final Agreement in 1984, the Gwich'in Comprehensive Land Claim Agreement in 1992 The Sahtu Dene and Métis Comprehensive Land Claim in 1993, the Tłicho Land Claim and Self-Government Agreement in 2003, and the Yukon Umbrella Final Agreement, finalized in 1999. Many other land claim and self-government agreements are in ongoing negotiations in the Northwest Territories. These agreements define how the land and resources will be managed in collaboration with the Dene and Inuit. Modern treaties have been negotiated in part of British Columbia and land claims in northern Quebec or Nunavik, and Labrador or Nunatsiavut. These modern treaties do not give complete control over land management to Indigenous peoples. They do, however, have the potential to allow for a stronger Indigenous voice in important issues like land management decisions. This is not often the case in many of the southern provinces. For example, many communities’ involvement regarding development is restricted to a reduced area of their traditional territory, confined to either on reserve or small parcels of land close to it. Currently, many First Nations have no formal agreements in place for self-government and co-management of resources. Despite this history, the idea that Indigenous peoples are disconnected from their lands and resources is often over-emphasized. This over-emphasis remains a source of conflict between Indigenous peoples and settler governments. Indigenous knowledge continues to be marginalized with respect to resource management and decision making over the last number of decades, particularly in the north. There has been an increasing number of conflicts around land and resource development. With flare ups like the Oka Crisis in 1990 to Idle No More, Indigenous people continue to demonstrate their claims for control over their land, in the face of ever encroaching development. Many contemporary Indigenous peoples maintain a deep material and spiritual connection to their homelands. These include traditional subsistence activities like hunting, fishing, and gathering of medicines. This also includes other cultural practices and ceremonies that reinforce their connection to the land. Although many communities’ traditional territories have been reduced to a small fraction of their original size, Indigenous communities remain resilient. Aboriginal rights and title are entrenched in the Canadian constitution, and provide a foundation for Indigenous management over traditional territories where title has been established. Today, the threat of aggressive development of natural resources have serious impacts on local Indigenous populations, but also have grave global ramifications. These natural resources include renewable resources like timber or commercial fisheries and non-renewable resources like oil, gas, coal, and other mineral mining. Many Indigenous communities in Canada are overwhelmed by the number of new development applications that come in each year. Quality of water, availability of wildlife and the ability for current and future generations to continue to exercise treaty rights is the primary concern of many communities. The impacts of climate change have been highly evident in the polar regions of the planet. While temperatures are already increasing, we can see from this map that the biggest projected temperature changes will occur in the upper regions of Canada. The global rise in temperature has already caused a decrease in summer sea ice in the Arctic. In the fall, bodies of water take longer to freeze, and in the spring, the ice along the coastline melts more quickly along the Arctic Ocean and inland on the freshwater lakes and rivers. These impacts affect the habitat of arctic animal populations, such as polar bears, walruses, and seals. As such, they also affect the ability of Inuit and Dene to travel safely in the fall and spring to hunt and fish. Many arctic communities are also experiencing significant infrastructure challenges as the permafrost that supports their roads and buildings begins to melt. These impacts are exacerbated by existing challenges that includes poor and inadequate housing in remote communities. Changes in temperature and climatic patterns also impact the annual migrations of species like barren ground caribou and cause changes in species distributions of white-tail deer, magpies, and various types of plants and animals. The Dene and Inuit have intimate experiential knowledge about the changes affecting their lands and have been voicing their concerns for many years. Arctic scientists are also working to document the extensive changes happening in the north, and are working more and more with Inuit and Dene people. They're working towards combining the best tools from western science and Indigenous knowledge to understand how the land is changing. Dene and Inuit teachings are also proving central to developing plans of how people can adapt to climate change. Indigenous peoples have always adopted new ways of surviving in the face of change and are continuing to do so in modern contexts. Today, Indigenous peoples are adapting by shifting the harvest to other species and altering how and when to safely travel on land and ice. The development of oil sands deposits in northern Alberta has grown rapidly with advancements in the technology to process bitumen, the oil and sand composition commonly referred to as oil sands or tar sands. Advances in technology began to improve in the early 1990s, making oil production through bitumen processing more cost effective. The booming growth of the industry has had significant social and environmental consequences for Indigenous communities in the region. This includes the regional municipality of Wood Buffalo and the city of Fort McMurray. The community of Fort Chipewyan is approximately 200 kilometres downstream of the oil sands where the Athabasca River flows into Lake Athabasca. Fort Chipewyan is home to the Mikisew Cree First Nation and the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation. Fort Chip is one of the oldest European settlements in Alberta and was established in 1788 as a trading post. Contaminants from the oil sands developments near Fort McMurray have been shown to have negative implications for aquatic health. This includes deformities in fish due to the contamination of the sediment, disrupting the development of fish embryos. When fish lay their eggs on the bottom of the river, the soft membrane of the eggs are susceptible to toxins in the sediment and as the fish mature, they develop abnormally. Environmentally unsound practices that lead to toxic fish and wildlife have serious impact on human health as they're consumed. Since all living beings are connected, the health of the land is directly related to the health of the people. One study conducted in 2010, in the Fort McMurray region showed that levels of various mineral byproducts of oil sands development, cadmium, lead, mercury, zinc, and others exceeded the guidelines that have been set in Canada and Alberta for aquatic wildlife health. The implications of large scale intensive development in the oil sands region for local Indigenous communities is profound. Large areas of land have been completely stripped of all vegetation for open pit mining and even larger areas have become restricted for industrial safety reasons. These impact significant portions of traditional hunting areas for local communities, forcing people to travel far from their home to hunt and to gather medicine and food. The impacts to local communities raise questions about who benefits the most from large scale development and who bears the brunt of the cost? There are trade-offs between economic development based in extractive industries and the social and environmental implications of such developments. [MUSIC]
