PARTNERING IN COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT
May19, 2004
Over the past four years The Northern Forest Diversification Centre in The Pas has developed a community development model targeted towards the small First Nation/Metis Communities of Manitoba. Many of these communities have little or no economic base, other than the traditional activities of trapping, commercial fishing, guiding, and working for local or regional governments. Unfortunately there are only a limited number of traplines, commercial fishing licenses, guide jobs, and government positions in each community.
The reality is that the majority of families in these communities are trapped in the false economy of social assistance, with all the social ills that such an inactive lifestyle perpetuates. For many of the sixty plus small forest communities in Manitoba, 60% to 90% unemployment has been the norm for decades. We, at the NFDC hear first-hand about families whose only option to increase family income, is to have more children. This option would appear only to increase the problem, and we can only imagine the amount of tax dollars that is needed annually to support such a system.
Using Non-Timber Forest Products as a basis to create income streams through community-based education and training, with an ongoing support system of product and market development, and mentoring appears to be working. After training in eight communities and training approximately 100 wild harvesters, the NFDC now has a database of over 200 harvesters from 22 communities. Harvesters are earning anywhere from a few hundred dollars to several thousand dollars per year. The NFDC is also supporting several home-based businesses as a result of the training programs.
Our most successful training programs have occurred where the majority of participants have been women, and local women chair the four most active wild harvester associations. In the last several months, the NFDC has increased its efforts to further support the activities of local wild harvester associations. In two communities, the NFDC has announced that only members of the association will be allowed to sell product to the NFDC. Within a few months, a harvester certification system will be introduced, and only trained and certified harvesters will be allowed to deliver certain botanical products to the NFDC. Local associations will eventually have the ability to certify their own members, as well as regulate the conduct of their members through a newly drafted Code of Ethics. This Code of Ethics will be eventually introduced to all wild harvesters in Manitoba. This will allow the harvesters to take ownership of this industry and regulate the actions of their members.
The NFDC faces several challenges in the delivery and expansion plans for this NTFP Industry. It is essential that there be a local contact person in each community who would be capable of delivering the ongoing training, overseeing a quality control program, allocating the NFDC orders, and organizing meetings. We see also the need for NTFP regional service centres, which would each operate a buying depot, a training shop, and an inventory warehouse. These regional centres would be staffed by at least one person, who would coordinate the future training and quality control assurance program for the region.
The NFDC has been promoting this models for expansion for over two years, and has generated considerable interest in the Lynn Lake, Thompson, and Barrows/Swan River areas. Unfortunately, a three-year program for the NFDC, funded by the Province of Manitoba and Western Economic Diversification (expected to be signed in a few weeks), does not include any funding for local community contacts or regional centres, even though the requirements for these was mentioned in the three-year strategy.
After recent discussions with Pat Lachance, Program Consultant for Health Canada and Regional Advisor for Rural Secretariat, Agri-Food Canada, it appears that there may be interest in exploring the delivery of the recent Health Canada initiative of Food Security in the North through the NFDC and the local harvesters associations. Local associations consist mainly of unemployed women, most existing on social assistance. Through the NFDC training programs, they are beginning to realize that there is opportunity in the forest around them, including the use and marketing of wild foods. Every association speaks of the increased family activity of harvesting and processing NTFP’s, and renewed sense of returning to their roots and living off the land. Expansion of this program to include the Health Canada Initiative would appear to be a win-win situation.
Using and expanding the NFDC community development model would also allow the documentation of results and delivery of a program directly to the folks for which it is intended. I would propose further discussion of this concept with a goal of a joint venture for a period of at least two years, preferably three years, which would match the Northern Forest Diversification Centre’s current funding program.
Dave Buck
Manager, Northern Forest Diversification Centre
The Pas, Manitoba
Ph: 204-627-8681
Email: dbuck@nfdc.ca
Website: www.nfdc.ca
