Indigenous engagement

To support the National Strategy Respecting Environmental Racism and Environmental Justice (the Strategy), Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) has expanded its efforts to engage First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples across Canada on environmental justice and racism.

Early Indigenous engagement on policy development for the Strategy has mostly been topic specific. This includes community-level discussions and conversations with infrastructure-focused groups, along with some general engagement.

Engagement overview

Engagement with First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples helped shape a Strategy on environmental justice and racism. The Strategy is guided by three key objectives that reflect Indigenous knowledge, lived realities, and rights.

These objectives include:

• better awareness of First Nations, Inuit and Métis knowledge and understandings of environmental racism and environmental justice
• explore potential mechanisms to assess, prevent, and address instances of environmental racism and advance environmental justice
• working to strengthen two-way communication and collaboration with First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples. This will help address environmental racism and advance environmental justice together

These objectives ensure that Indigenous perspectives directly shape the Strategy. They inform how environmental justice and racism are understood, highlight First Nations, Inuit, and Métis priorities, and guide proposed actions.

Initial engagement is not formal consultation. It aimed to help inform policy development and drafting of the Strategy.

The consultation on the draft Strategy, which aims to advance environmental justice and assess, prevent and address environmental racism, is currently open. The public is invited to share their comments from June 26, 2026, to August 10, 2026.

Aamjiwnaang First Nation (AAFN)-ECCC Joint Committee on Environmental Justice

In 2023, senior officials from Environment and Climate Change Canada attended a summit hosted by Aamjiwnaang First Nation in Sarnia. The summit gave Aamjiwnaang First Nation a chance to share concerns about nearby industry and air quality issues. Their community is surrounded by “Chemical Valley,” which includes over 60 refinery and petrochemical sites in Sarnia, Ontario. Community members have long raised concerns about air pollution and the health impacts of long-term exposure to harmful substances.

Piloting a community-level approach to advancing Environmental Justice

In 2025, Aamjiwnaang First Nation and ECCC signed an agreement to create a Joint Committee. The Committee has built relationships, shared information and perspectives, and drawn on practical experience with targeted collaboration to support co-developing actions to advance environmental justice. Lessons learned from this pilot project help inform the practical approaches described in the national Strategy. These lessons will help guide future relationships and collaborations with other Indigenous communities on environmental issues.

Engagement document: Indigenous environmental justice

What: Engagement documents are one-way governments share information and gather input from the public and interested groups. They help shape new laws, regulations, policies, or programs by inviting feedback early in the process.

The Indigenous Environmental Justice engagement document included prompts to gather perspectives from First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples. Input from the paper and related webinars will help shape the national Strategy.

The opportunity to provide input on this engagement document has concluded. This webpage will be updated with a summary when available.

Discussion series

Virtual Distinctions-Based Discussion Series

ECCC organized a series of virtual discussions on environmental justice that focused on the unique perspectives and priorities of First Nations, Inuit, and Métis communities. ECCC gave a brief presentation before leading group discussions with all participants. 

Topic-Based Virtual Discussion Series

These virtual sessions brought together subject-matter experts and community leaders to share their perspectives on environmental justice and environmental racism. The series included sessions on:

• discussions with people who participate in activities on land and on the ice and/or who live in rural or remote areas
• community environmental leaders: a focused discussion with community leaders who help manage and protect the environment
• urban Indigenous perspectives: a focused discussion with First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples and organizations living and working in urban areas
• universities and Indigenous organizations: a focused discussion with Indigenous academics and representatives of Indigenous organizations

The discussion series concluded in March 2026. A summary will be offered online once it is available.

A note on funding

Currently, there isn’t a dedicated fund or program specifically for Indigenous engagement in developing the National Strategy.

Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada (CIRNAC) provides core funding to support Indigenous representative organizations. This funding helps build capacity for these organizations to participate in government policy development and decision-making (Contributions to support the basic organizational capacity of Indigenous Representative Organizations).

Representative organizations with an interest in these topics are also encouraged to reach out to Environment and Climate Change Canada at EJ-JE@ec.gc.ca.