#33 of 42 articles from the Special Report:
Conversations
Ethel Blondin-Andrew is a former Liberal MP and cabinet minister now working with the Indigenous Leadership Initiative. Photo submitted by Ethel Blondin-Andrew
For Ethel Blondin-Andrew, the most important solution to Canada s climate crisis is also dangerously underfunded: Indigenous-led conservation.
“We have the vision, we need the resources,” Blondin-Andrew said in this year s first Conversations event with
Canada’s National Observer founder and editor-in-chief Linda Solomon Wood on Thursday evening. “We have a head start. We have the fundamental traditional knowledge, the relationship.”
Blondin-Andrew was the first Indigenous woman elected to the House of Commons and to serve in federal cabinet. She now works with the Indigenous Leadership Initiative (ILI) to develop Indigenous governance and stewardship of the land via programs that train Guardians and educate youth on land use planning. She explained at
Create: 01/21/2021 - 04:20
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The Anishnawbe Business Professional Association will kick off the 2021 season of their Virtual Campfire Series with the first of three webinars on Indigenous-led natural climate solutions co-hosted with the Conservation Through Reconciliation Partnership. The presenters will explore how Indigenous communities could benefit from business opportunities related to land stewardship while reducing climate change impacts. They will also hear about current barriers and ideas for advancing thriving, Indigenous-led natural climate solutions in Canada. The event will take place on January 29 from 1-3 p.m. EST.
The event will be moderated by Jason Rasevych from the Anishinawbe Business Professional Association.
“It’s a matter of life or death. It’s a matter of being able to keep your voice.”
This is how Dene trailblazer Ethel Blondin-Andrew, the first Indigenous woman elected to the House of Commons and to serve in federal cabinet, described building Indigenous leadership and power during a 2019 United Nations panel on Indigenous women in politics.
Blondin-Andrew has kept her voice from the beginning. She delivered her first speech in Canada’s House of Commons in her Dene language. Through her 17 years as an MP, she brought issues of northern Indigenous sovereignty to Ottawa, fighting against infringement on self-governance, whether by the Meech Lake Accord or pulp mills along the Mackenzie River.