Indigenous women in Northern Canada creating sustainable livelihoods through tourism

In summer 2022, the Northern WE invited Indigenous women entrepreneurs from northern Newfoundland and Labrador, northern Québec, Nunavut, the Yukon and Northwest Territories to collaborate on an Indigenous-led and ally-supported research project.

Over shared stories of lived experiences and examples of best practices, participants discussed the barriers faced by Indigenous women entrepreneurs in the North and their colonial origins.

History of colonization

The Indian Act devastated the human rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Government programs normalized public views of Indigenous people as inferior, advancing assimilation efforts to resolve Canada’s so-called “Indian Problem.”

With the government classifying indigenous people as male persons with Indian blood, it further disenfranchised indigenous women.

If an indigenous woman married outside her community, she lost her status.

Her children were also denied their right to status, setting the foundation for inter-generational vulnerability and cultural alienation.

Today, indigenous women are 3.5 times more likely to experience violence than their non-indigenous counterparts.

Almost 1,200 missing and murdered indigenous women and girls were identified by law enforcement between 1980 and 2012. The victim count grows to this day.

Other compounding factors Indigenous women are faced with include racism, sexual identity, poverty and isolation.

Indigenous tourism

Anything that sustainably connects people to the planet and their culture by providing sustenance through entrepreneurship is tourism.

This includes more conventional things like tours and visitor accommodations. It also includes less conventional things like authentic crafts, music and dance, food and healing, ceremony and storytelling.

Today, tourism training aligned with the Canadian education system and financial programs and the policies that govern them are predominantly developed by non-Indigenous people.

Non-Indigenous organizations determine who qualifies for training and financial support.

These conventional systems are not designed to factor the lived realities of Indigenous women into their operations.

The complex challenges facing Indigenous women in Canada’s North cannot be resolved in isolation or at the discretion of the entities that created them.

Often lacking Western educational requirements, business experience or associated skill sets, Indigenous women experience significant bias in accessing support.

Geographic location, infrastructure deficits and poverty compound barriers.

Understanding success

Success requires healing and understanding the impact of intergenerational trauma.

Viewing success through this lens places value on equity, the concept of continuity of culture and Indigenous integration and stewardship of their lands.

Connecting women to sustainable livelihoods strengthens the probability of achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals that prioritize equity and inclusion.

The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples provides a road map to advance the declaration and address injustices against Indigenous people.

It is time for indigenous-led and ally-supported solutions to create pathways to well-being by dismantling the barriers that exclude indigenous women from building sustainable livelihoods through tourism.

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