1.1. Local Indigenous food systems

1.1. Introduction

Local Indigenous food systems include the harvest of locally available, non-domesticated wildlife (i.e., plants and animals) by Indigenous Peoples for their own consumption and for food sharing with family and community. Also referred to as traditional food, country food, or wild food, the rights of Indigenous Peoples to hunt for food was enshrined in the first historical treaties and is a key consideration in modern comprehensive land claims. Local food represents an important source of energy, protein, and micronutrients to Indigenous communities across northern North America and consumption of local food has been associated with lower rates of obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease, and higher rates of food security. Local Indigenous food systems also embody the knowledge, relationships, and reciprocities that connect people to nature and create the possibility of “being alive well” (Adelson 2000). Accordingly, local food systems are inextricably linked with identity and the cultural and spiritual well-being of Indigenous peoples, representing both a cultural strength and a source of identity. Language and food are closely related components of Indigenous cultures and the richness of Indigenous languages, particular with respect to words describing land and water, seasons and weather, plants and animals, as well as harvest and food, across a multitude of Indigenous dialects, languages, and language families speaks to the collective richness and diversity of local food and culture. Indigenous Peoples continue to depend on the harvest and consumption of wild plants and animals as critical sources of nutrition, tradition, identity, culture, and relationship to land, which individually and collectively relate to Indigenous conceptions of health. Accordingly, we suggest the following definition: Local Indigenous food systems are the culture and wellness of harvesting, consuming, and conserving local biodiversity.

Store-bought food is also a key contributor to nutrition and food security in northern and Arctic communities, and the high cost of store-bought food, combined with low incomes and limited access to wage economies, is a widely identified barrier to food security in northern regions. High rates of food insecurity across northern Canada have been attributed to a variety of factors including limited access, availability, and use of healthy country food or healthy store-bought food, especially in Nunavut and Nunavik, where food insecurity affects 50% to 80% of households, which is 10 times higher than the Canadian average. The extent to which economy, environment, and culture co-determine food security is reflected in how the Nunavut Food Security Coalition (2014, page 2) describes the four components of food security: “availability (enough wildlife on the land or groceries in the store), accessibility (adequate money for hunting equipment or store-bought food, and the ability to obtain it), quality (healthy food that is culturally valued), and use (knowledge about how to obtain, store, prepare, and consume food).”

Economic development, food security, and climate change adaptation have emerged as key pillars of northern policy and investment. However, economic investment often focuses on job creation through natural resource exploration and extraction, food security investment in subsidy programs intended to reduce the cost of store-bought food, and climate adaptation in relation to transportation, infrastructure preparedness, and technology-assisted agri-food production. While these are important initiatives and investments that are helping to transform northern economies and communities, they can be argued to be peripheral and transient to the primary economy that has long defined and continues to define northern regions. In many, if not most, communities and households, on most, if not all, days of the year, local food is the food that feeds people, the labour that employs people, the economy that supports people, and the culture that defines people.

Local food consumption is being negatively impacted by the high costs of harvesting equipment, changing food preferences, and climate changes that are impacting wildlife and restricting access to harvesting areas. Climate change has impacted and will continue to impact local foods, local food systems, and local food security in many, profound ways, particularly at high latitudes, where both observed and projected warming is most pronounced. Community concerns about the potential negative impacts of climate change frequently focus on declining or disappearing wildlife populations, changes in the health and behaviour of animals, and difficulties and dangers associated with travelling on land, water, and ice (Gérin-Lajoie et al. 2015). Research on environmental change and local food security needs to identify the likely climate change impacts on key food species as well as the adaptation strategies that enable the maintenance of local food security in changing environments.

Further, in northern regions, job creation and economic development often focus on the exploitation of natural resources that may negatively impact land, water, and wildlife populations. Not surprisingly, local opposition to or approval for transportation and resource development initiatives most often depends on their impacts on wildlife populations, the environment, and the integrity of the local food system. As articulated by the Nunavut Food Security Coalition (2014, page 7), “preserving the ecological integrity of Nunavut food resources is a key component of a sustainable food system in Nunavut, and is therefore of concern to food security.” How best to support this mixed economy – in a manner that maintains the integrity of the local food system - is a complex and formidable challenge. Commodification of culture and tradition describes part of the challenge, though food has forever been a commodity exchanged through sharing networks defining traditional economies. Community-suggested improvements for the Nutrition North subsidy program emphasized the need to expand the program to address economic barriers to country food access. Community-led research on climate change adaptation has shifted adaptation focus towards helping hunters safely access harvest sites, community freezers for the safe storage of country food, and elder-to-youth knowledge transmission related to the land, local food harvest and its preparation.

Contemporary local food systems across northern Canada and in Northern Quebec are defined by a mixed economy shaped by four primary considerations: local food, money, time, and know-how. Local food is a highly valued and prioritized common good. Money is required for the fuel and the equipment required to access, harvest, prepare, and share local food. Time is required for travel and harvest activities, with the amount of time required for safe travel and successful harvest often unpredictable due to the uncertainties of wildlife, weather, and equipment. Know-how - spanning everything from where and how to travel safely on land, water, and ice, how to use, maintain, and repair equipment, when and how to successfully harvest wildlife, how to butcher, share, prepare, and consume what has been harvested, and how to ensure conservation, stewardship and respectful relationship with land and wildlife - is an essential supporting condition that must be learned from experienced harvesters, then repeatedly practiced prior to becoming skilled, experienced, and proficient. Living in settled communities offers better access to wage economies, government services, and social networks, but increases the travel distances required to harvest local food, which requires more money, more equipment, more time, and more uncertainty. The time requirements, flexibility, and seasonal windows-of-opportunity involved in harvesting wildlife can be incompatible with full-time and permanent wage employment. Trade-offs among money, time, and know-how can result in those that have the money required to harvest local food not having the time, those that have the time not having the money, and many that have the money and the time lacking the knowledge, experience, or opportunity. Monetized harvester support programs (e.g., hunter income support) and monetized local food markets exist in varied forms across northern Quebec, but their immediate-term effectiveness and longer-term, broader-scale implications are poorly understood.

Gender also plays an important role in local indigenous food systems. Much local food and climate change research has focused on traditionally male-dominated land-based activities such as hunting, fishing, and trapping. However, Indigenous women also contribute a central, foundational role in local food systems, particularly in relation to food preparation, food choice, nutrition, and health. In many First Nations and Inuit households, women are the main income earners; their participation in the wage economy provides financial resources that support household harvesting activities but also reduces the time women have available to themselves engage in local food activities. Women also tend to be disproportionately affected by food insecurity, hunger, and poverty globally, across the circumpolar north, and in northern Quebec. Research also indicates women tend to prioritize the eating of healthy local food in their household and to have specific food security concerns related to feeding their children.

​The experience of profound ecological and cultural change is not something new to northern communities, and the continuity of local food consumption, spanning historical and recent change, is a testament to the innovativeness and adaptability of Indigenous Peoples and their local food systems. Describing local food systems as traditional emphasizes their antiquity, their multi-generational depth, and their connection to the cultural history of communities. On the other hand, food, culture, and environment are constantly changing, independently and in relation to each other, as a result of environmental change, but also due to diverse forms of social and societal change.

The WECLIFS project seeks to document and anticipate the impacts of climate change on traditional food security in northern Québec, including the Cree communities of Eeyou Istchee and the Inuit communities of Nunavik, through the bringing together of existing knowledge and the co-creation of new knowledge. This research is intended to support the adaptive capacity of northern communities in relation to the integrity of their local food systems and the contributions of local food to well-being, culture, and relationship to land. Specifically, we seek to co-identify, with local knowledge holders and regional organizations, adaptation and mitigation strategies that can minimize the negative impacts of climate change on local food systems, while strengthening the social-ecological resilience of Eeyou Istchee and Nunavik.

The above description of local Indigenous food systems has been informed, in part, by the following sources: