Climate change hits northern Indigenous communities disproportionately due to factors such as environmental racism, neoliberal environmental policies, threats to Arctic sovereignty, and inadequate mitigation and adaptation measures. Environmental discrimination exploits disadvantaged communities and discriminatory enforcement practices of regulations, which finally translate to land and resource degradation. Neoliberalism views growth and resource extraction as superior to the environment and indigenous people as a result of unintended plunder of indigenous territories. The destruction of homelands is the compulsory shifting away of native lands to make way for environmental mismanagement, resource depletion, and climate change effects. Strengthening the sovereignty of Indigenous residents of the North in the Arctic is the most critical policy in the national interest of Indigenous peoples of the North so they can continue self-governing. The goal of mitigation strategies is to expel greenhouse emissions and tackle climate change, while the main aim of the adaptive approach is to deal with the negative impacts of climate change. Appropriate agitation and adjustment techniques must exploit the indigenous knowledge, socioeconomic factors that weaken, and participation of the Indigenous and Forest Peoples in decision-making.
The increasing numbers of Northern Indigenous communities are spread across the land, from the Arctic Tundra of the Northwestern Territories, Nunavut, and Yukon to the Subarctican regions of Northern Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, and Alberta (Ford et al., 2018). These indigenous peoples have lived on these lands for several thousand years and have learned to endure and adapt to extreme weather changes. They have also become a part of the environment that we today call nature through their interdependent relationship with the world around them.
The ancient and culturally unique way of living of Northern Indigenous communities of Canada is shaped heavily by the land, water, and diverse natural environment. While many people are nowadays submerged in office work and city life, others engage in local subsistence activities, such as hunting, fishing, trapping, and gathering. This kind of activity is crucial to their body health, and at the same time, their culture, way of living, and alignment with their spirituality are also dependent on it. The Northern Indigenous who are kept alive by their ancestors’ understanding of the environment and the ability to adapt to the cold northern climate could live and progress without a break. The tradition and the way of development to be rooted in the land unquestionably a foundation for their cultural identities, language, and traditional knowledge about the environment where they belong.
Although they have a rich history of creativity and their ability to adapt, Northern indigenous groups still face severe social and financial challenges that make them more susceptible to climate change dangers. There are numerous communities that all show insufficiency in the standards of housing, limited clean water and sanitation, food insecurities, and higher rates of poverty and unemployment than non-Indigenous individuals. Colonialism, which has included forced relocations, residential schools, and the takeover of traditional governances, has not only created intergenerational traumas and injustices; it also operates at the system level. These historical errors have drawn the majority of the Northern Indigenous communities into a state where they are struggling with economic initiatives, and social services are minimal. They also encounter obstacles when seeking services and resources. The major problem for remote communities in the North is often a poor infrastructure and logistics to provide all necessary facilities. Transportation issues, high living costs, and faulty communication networks might change asses to required products, services, and emergency response, which then magnify consequences of climate change outputs such as extreme climax instances like floods, storms, and disruptions in traditional food supplies.
Indigenous peoples of the North, who have been affected by environmental racism, have a robust history of colonial policies and approaches. The resettlement of communities, the expropriation of ancestral lands, and the establishment of extractive industries without proper consultation and consent from the Indigenous people have also caused ecological damage and cultural disruption. The Canadian government passed the Indian Act and Numbered Treaties policies and legislation, which established the foundations of land theft and natural resources exploitation without considering the interests of the Aboriginal communities (Government of Canada, 2023).
Through environmental racism, northern communities have faced excessive levels of pollution caused by natural resource extraction, pollution of surface water areas, and the impacts of climate change. Eating infected traditional foods can be a health risk for most communities. Because they are the community most affected by the land and water resources, they are also the most vulnerable to environmental degradation. Galway et al. (2022) argue that land is critical for understanding how climate change affects health and guides strategies for protecting and promoting health and healing during the climate crisis. Additionally, the need for more infrastructure and capabilities in many Arctic communities increases their exposure to environmental dangers. Inappropriate settlements, inadequate sanitation systems, and health services with limited water access worsen the situation for these communities.
These negative impacts on northern Indigenous communities, where environmental racism is more intricate, are very complicated. Cancer incidence and the chronic disease of cancer among neighborhood residents experiencing ecological risk factors are said to be more prevalent in such areas. The damage to traditional food sources and the interruptions of hunting, fishing, and gathering ways of living brought only more troubles to humans and the loss of discriminatory cultural practices and knowledge systems. In addition to that, the issue of the environment ruined and cultural lands claimed makes the situation much more noticeable when it concerns cultural identities and spiritual health of the northern Indigenous communities. One of the most striking examples of this loss of connection includes the disappearance of sacred places, demolishing traditional rituals, and uproot of ties to ancestral lands, which often result in deep psychological discomfort, estrangement from the community, and cultural erosion. Economically, there is no literal comprehension for their generations to hoe in the traditional conduct. As a result, they may also, in turn, form the terms of development projects that their region is going to receive. The effects of climate change remain a threat to this area, namely the melting of permafrost, the modification of the curve of wildlife migration, and unpredictable weather, which hopefully will not negatively impact economic well-being and food security.
According to the neoliberal environmental management policy, Indigenous territories become the locational choice for extractive activities like mining, oil and gas search, and large-scale industrial projects. Unlike other projects, Indigenous people participate very little or even do not partake, hence encroaching on their sovereignty and freedom to management of their ancestral land. The resource extraction on the lands of the indigenous community has made communities people flee, interrupt the indigenous people from practicing their traditional land use, and herald pollution of the indigenous people’s essential resources such as air, water, and soil. Indigenous Peoples of Northern Canada, whose health and safety depended to a great extent on the land, are acutely affected by the changes that are altering their way of life.
Neoliberal ecological government policies frequently fail to acknowledge the principles of the original sovereignty right and the facts of the unauthorized existence concerning their lands, water sources, and resources. Indigenous entities often participate in decision-making processes as plaintiffs; they are relegated to the margins or given far too little attention in consultations; thus, their interests and traditional knowledge are easily set aside. This lack of agreement, holding their claim for sovereignty as the highest principle, has been the significant root of the problem of illegal occupation of their lands and preventing them from independent decision-making. In addition, this situation has perpetuated and divided power among the native groups, resulting in the continued marginalization of Indigenous voices in events that affect their lives and that of their cultures.
The effects of neoliberal environmental management policies on Northern Indigenous communities have gone beyond just affecting the traditional lifestyles and food sources. Land degradation and air and aquatic pollution from mining, oil and gas exploration, and industrial development have hurt traditional foods such as hunting, fishing, and gathering. The loss of the communities’ ability to obtain traditional foods has put the food security of these communities at risk, as well as their cultural continuity and traditional knowledge systems. The majority of Indigenous communities have become dependent on imported and processed foods, which play their role in the increase of diet-related health problems and the decline of the traditional foodways that have helped such communities to survive throughout history. Moreover, conventional land-use practices are being disrupted, and communities are losing access to spiritual sites and culturally valuable places. This is causing much stress among the northern First Nations. Consequently, these may result in the younger generations eroding traditional knowledge, languages, and artistic practices.
The Arctic is one of those regions suffering from the fastest and most severe effects of global warming, with temperatures growing twice as fast as the rest of the world. As a result, the ice sheets are melting rapidly because of this effect called Arctic amplification, and the permafrost is warming also. This causes many ecological disturbances and affects the well-being of many communities that depend on these ecosystems. According to Dawson et al. (2020), global warming is thermalizing The Canadian Arctic region three times quicker than the rest of the world, which is driven by climate change. The shrinking sea ice destroyed the longstanding routes. Their only way back to their indigenous food and land base is to travel along it, which means that it can now be dangerous and impossible for modern Indians to track their hunting grounds. The thawing of permafrost, the frozen ground below the northernmost part of the earth, presents widespread complex issues that can cause structures, transportation routes, and pipelines to collapse. The buildings, roads, and pipelines can become unsafe and troublesome to be inaccessible.
Arctic inhabitants such as the Northern Indigenous of Canada that live off the land have been harshly and hurtfully affected by climate change through the changes to the hunting and fishing grounds that have been a unique part of their lifestyle forever. Weather changes, animals’ migration breakdowns, and the less predictability of local food sources have exerted difficulties, perhaps, to the subsistence practices and other traditional lifestyles of these communities (Indigenous Climate Hub, 2020). As the ice caps melt and habitats move, such sea animals as caribou, seals, and whales may decline in number near their home grounds, which consequently drives hunters to distant areas and towards new hunting tactics. Contrary to this, fish depletion, which has been attributable to changes in water temperatures and flow patterns, was once the primary source of livelihood and food security for most fishing people.
Losing the hunting and fishing ground areas and arranging the old food patterns are the most serious issues that directly affect Northern indigenous communities’ food and water security. They are communities that have been and continue to rely on land for their livelihoods and survival but are now facing the devastating impacts of climate change, which often interferes with using and maintaining traditional food sources. The cause of water contamination from contaminants that enter drinking water systems in the North via drainage from thawed permafrost. Due to this, the communities have gone for energy-intensive as well as costly treatment processes, distant sources of water, or even transportation of water from distant sources, which magnifies their problem.
The phenomena of climate change play an enormous role in the culture and creations of Northern Indigenous people, who closely identify themselves with the traditional environment and nature. Due to the increasing rules and regulations against hunting, fishing, and foraging, the experience, knowledge, and heritage that were transmitted to us by our ancestors can gradually become extinct. People often have to find a new place for their sacred areas and sites, which, due to natural changes like erosion, flooding, or relocating communities, could lead to severe consequences for the spiritual and cultural health of the communities. Another area for improvement lies in the disruption of the indigenous food systems with growing dependence on imported and packaged food, which leads to the loss of the traditional practices and knowledge fixed in conventional diets and food preparation.
Indigenous communities whose homes are situated in the North of the country went through a transition process of the threat of displacement from a far shadow to a more immediate one as climate change worsens. Sea level rise, coastal erosion, freeze off of permafrost, and unprecedented climate phenomena lead to synchronous siting of the settlement and the need for resettling communities as the key choice. Making room for entirely new communities often demands a complicated and excruciating experience, exemplified by the logistics, culture, and feelings problems. It is a translocation of people and a sort of uprooting, a social workshop disrupting the connection of people to the land, producing a gradual loss of embedded traditional knowledge systems inseparably fixed on this particular location.
In addition to site destruction, the loss of sacred places, culturally meaningful landscapes, and traditional lands that have been at the heart of spiritual and cultural practices of Northern Indigenous communities since time immemorial is also a significant aspect. Under the influence of changing climate, the features of the natural environment are disrupted, and these sites become either unavailable or irreversible, which results in the breakage of links between people and those places which form the foundation of human life. The depriving of native lands threatens these communities’ ways of life and the food security problem they face. It deprives the people of the power to teach traditional knowledge and of the practice of culture passed down from generation to generation, which involves certain regions and the resources within themselves.
Access to the feeling of being connected with the northern area may trigger the mental and cultural health worries of the communities in the North. They do not merely leave their ancestral ground; they exchange a deep sadness and loss, and a cultural richness, which is the effect of related life in the bother’s intrigued families for homemade cultural sabotage. Thus, some people can struggle not only with the idea of relocation but also with the process; it can become a source of specific stresses and traumas as people have to adjust to these lives that are different from the ones they are used to with the social structures unrecognizable for them. The loss of cultural practices essential for a subsistence lifestyle and the destruction of the rites and ceremonies essential to their culture leads to loneliness, identity crisis, and missing the native cultural traditions. Finally, the loss of relationship of Indigenous people with their natural environment or their homelands, where cultural knowledge systems were based on a connection with a particular piece of landscape, can make the community vulnerable to deep generational and psychological distress as well as the danger of the cultures ceasing to exist.
Indigenous knowledge and adaptive techniques in northern indigenous communities prescribed to this geographical area continue through an ancient coexistence between local communities and the Arctic. The learned skills include watching, monitoring, and reporting the environmental changes and observing and learning about sustainable resource management practices in the face of climate variability. Such knowledge can significantly relieve the mitigation and adaptation of climate change. However, traditional governance systems have perfected multi-layer society for detailed dosage, positioning of animals, and environmental matters that can be equally used in studying and responding to climate change. Besides, rotating game, hunting, and gathering, comprehensive food sources, and environmentally safe resource utilization will allow the indigenous tribes to have strong resilience to climate disasters.
Despite all their legendary mastery of information and the attempts to adapt to climatic changes, the Northern Indigenous community still faces many issues in making a successful adaptation program. The constraining factors are economic factors, such as inadequate finance and poor infrastructure, that limit institutions from adopting adaptation measures and new methods in traditional practices to overcome the problems. Cultural barriers come first in preventing indigenous peoples from having a say in the decision-making process. Existing institutional arrangements need more room for representatives, and the voices from within such communities are still being suppressed. Social barriers, including the erosion of transgenerational knowledge due to colonization and abrupt cultural transformation, also affect the capacity of the community to resort to their conventional adaptive practices and knowledge systems.
Although Northern Indigenous communities face these many challenges, most communities have taken practical steps towards remedying the effects of climate change by implementing community-driven initiatives. This includes the Inuit communities in Nunavut that developed detailed adaptation plans that encompass traditional knowledge and scientific data to guide food security, infrastructure development, and environmental monitoring decisions. In the Northwest Territories, the government of T’licho has created a monitoring program for communities where traditional experience and Western science work together to discover environmental changes, which in turn is used to plan, organize, and manage land use and the exploitation of resources. Another effective initiative is establishing community-based renewable energy projects that include solar and wind power plants to lower greenhouse gas emissions and achieve energy security. Other such initiatives involve building culture-based education and outreach programs that promote understanding of climate change and its adaptation strategies.
As we witness the effects of climate change and exemplified conflicts within indigenous communities of the North, in which they are faced with the loss of self-determination and environmental rights, the court’s role has evolved into an essential component. The Indigenous groups are revoking the current system of courts to force the state and the companies to be responsible for their input in climate change and the right to traditional lands, resources, and the overall environment. Sometimes, courts or panels of judges have recognized that climate degradation has adverse impacts on Indigenous people and communities and sided with protecting the interests and rights of Indigenous people. That is, the Wet’suwet’en, in 2020, took recourse to the Canadian judiciary; specifically, they moved a petition to Canada’s federal officials to take a more front-line role in efforts to curb climate change (UNEP). Thus, however, in cases of Indigenous rights and climate change suits here and there, the outcomes could be specific to the docket of different legal systems as well as governments of the corporation’s involvement in the Indigenous sovereignty concern on environmental justice.
These are the article issues that have brought evidence of the horrible and disproportionate impacts of the climate crisis on the Northern Indigenous inhabitants of Canada. These influences have shown that the connection between environmental racism, the neoliberal ecological management plans, the threats to Arctic sovereignty, and the gaps in both climate change mitigation and adaptation plans are complex. The indigenous experience of the colonial legacy and systemic racism continue to destroy lands and internally diminish the traditional way of life. Climate change has only amplified it. The fact that the current problems of the Indigenous peoples in the North can be solved only by multidisciplinary approaches is based on the changes in policies, financial support, and Indigenous people’s recognition and rights. Comprehensive environmental regulations, which ought to be strictly governed and allowed to take effect upon the approval of community leaders before any extraction of resources on reservations can be started, should be made.
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