Building Local Food Capacity as a Food Security Strategy for Northern Indigenous Communities

Over the past several decades, Indigenous populations in Canada have undergone dietary and lifestyle transformations which have resulted in alarming rates of obesity and obesity-related diseases, especially type 2 diabetes mellitus.   While it is clear that there are important benefits to traditional diets, there are critical barriers in acquiring sufficient amounts of wild food for regular consumption.  As a result, people in many Indigenous communities are both struggling to harvest land-based foods and have limited access to quality market foods.  This paper was presented at the ISGP Signature Series conference “Food Security and Diet-linked Public Health Challenges,”  convened Sept. 20-23, 2015, in Fargo, North Dakota, U.S., in cooperation with North Dakota State University.