Source: Indigenous Food Systems Network
Year: n.d.
“The Indigenous Food Systems Network Website was developed by the WGIFS and is designed to allow individuals and groups involved with Indigenous food related action, research, and policy reform to network and share relevant resources and information.”
Source: Valerie Segrest at TEDxRainier
Year: 2014
“The Indian tribes around the Puget Sound have practiced sustainable balance with its foods for thousands of years, but now the prairie lands and mountain berry meadows are disappearing and salmons runs are dwindling. Valerie Segrest, a member of Muckleshoot tribe and native foods educator tells us to listen to the salmon and cedar tree, who teach us a life of love, generosity and abundance, and to remember when we take better care of our land, we are taking better care of ourselves.”
Source: Food Secure Canada
Year: 2011
"We are a group of community-based activists, scholars and storytellers who work on issues of food sovereignty. We come from diverse regions of Turtle Island and share fundamental beliefs towards the land and all she stands for. We represent fishing, hunting, and gathering peoples and bring an understanding of the impact of colonialism on our regions. Indigenous food systems include all of the land, soil, water, and air, as well as culturally important plant, fungi, and animal species that have sustained Indigenous peoples over thousands of years of participating in the natural world. "
Source: Native Women’s Association of Canada
Year: 2012
“This booklet is intended to provide some cultural context, as well as information about traditional foods. You’ll also find a few recipes on the wild side!”
Source: National Indigenous Diabetes Association
Year: 2020
“The National Indigenous Diabetes Association (NIDA) presents this resource booklet entitled “Gifts from our Relations”, which consists of commonly consumed traditional foods (plants/animals) that are Indigenous to our lands. Colonization, the reserve system, and residential schools have had significant negative impacts on Indigenous Peoples’ land bases, territories, and connections to the land. Regular harvesting and consumption of original foods has been largely replaced with a commercial supply of western, processed, non-nutritive foods. As noted by the Canada Truth and Reconciliation Commission, “...original foods were viewed by missionaries, educators and doctors as being diseased and inferior; in residential schools, teachers taught children to dislike their own foods and inculcated them with the poor eating habits of a non-Indigenous institution.”"
Source: Taylor Wilson, Shailesh Shukla
Year: 2020
“The 2019 Canadian Food Guide (CFG) was launched in January 2019 with a promise to be inclusive of multicultural diets and diverse perspectives on food, including the food systems of Indigenous communities. Some scholars argue that federally designed standard food guides often fail to address the myriad and complex issues of food security, well-being, and nutritional needs of Canadian Indigenous communities while imposing a dominant and westernized worldview of food and nutrition. In a parallel development, Indigenous food systems and associated knowledges and perspectives are being rediscovered as a hope and ways to improve current and future food security. Based on a review of relevant literature and our long-term collaborative learning and community based research engagements with Indigenous communities from Manitoba, we propose that Indigenous communities should develop their food guides considering their contexts, needs, and preferences.”
Source: Métis Centre, National Aboriginal Health Organization
Year: 2008
“This cookbook is full of many more modern recipes than those of olden times, but some of them still have the essence of the old. They are also a testament to the Métis mothers of the past who always found a way to throw together a great meal. To the young parents who will be using this book, remember the good things of your childhood, and as you prepare this food, use the energy from those good memories to re-create those old traditions of sharing good food, stories and laughter. That, I know for sure, will build strong families and a strong people.”
Source: First Nations Health Authority
Year: n.d.
The First Nations Health Authority has published an informative set of facts sheets on traditional food and its nutrition value, traditional harvesting methods, and history of use. Topics include: fish, seafood, wild game, birds, berries and other plant foods.
Source: North American Traditional Indigenous Food Systems; The Sioux Chef
Year: 2017
This diagram shows the foundations of an Indigenous food system model, from North American Traditional Indigenous Food Systems (NāTIFS), an organization founded by the Sioux Chef, Sean Sherman. NāTIFS is “dedicated to addressing the economic and health crises affecting Native communities by re-establishing Native foodways.” Read more about their work here.
Source: Waasegiizhig Nanaandawe’iyewigamig Health Access Center
Year: 2020
“This resource is the result of a partnership with community members and the WNHAC team. This resource highlights the connection between TRADITIONAL FOODS & HEALTH. The pages of this booklet share the important role of traditional foods as medicine. Food – in addition to GUIDANCE FROM A HEALTH CARE PROFESSIONAL and/or TRADITIONAL KNOWLEDGE KEEPER – is the best medicine to stay well. TRADITIONAL FOODS are connected to: THE LAND, LANGUAGE, and ENVIRONMENT. Colonization has broken connections to traditional foods and medicines. For this reason, we see an increase in chronic disease and food insecurity in communities. Reclaiming traditional diets is a way to be more food secure AND to prevent and treat diet-related illnesses. In this way, traditional foods and land-based food practices are healing. THIS TRADITIONAL FOOD GUIDE is built on ANISHINAABE LANGUAGE AND WISDOM. Honouring and sharing Anishinaabe knowledge is the best way to heal and care for each other.”
Source: University of Winnipeg
Year: 2020
“Taylor Wilson’s paper, Decolonizing Diets through Indigenous-focused food Guides, has recently been published in the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development. Her research comes in response to the latest Canadian Food Guide, which was launched in January 2019 with a promise to be inclusive of multicultural diets and diverse perspectives on food, including the food systems of Indigenous communities. Wilson’s paper is the result of a project she developed with Dr. Shailesh Shukla during her Master’s in Development Practice: Indigenous Development. Their research examines the scope and limitations of the most recent Canadian food guide and the opportunity to decolonize it.”
Source: Collaborative: Indigenous Health Circle, Thunder Bay District Health Unit, Lakehead University, Sustainable Food Systems Lab
Year: n.d.
Historically the Anishinaabe / Anishinaabeg / Anishinabek of the Lake Nipigon and Lake Superior regions used the sun, moons, planets and stars to guide community practices around time, harvesting, gathering, storing and preparing food and medicines. Most common is the use of the thirteen-moons to guide seasonal cycles and community practices.
