Food Deserts and First Nations

Indigenous Peoples living on-reserve live in food deserts, areas where healthy foods are far, expensive, and largely inaccessible while foods high in sugar, sodium, and saturated fats are far more readily available at a lower cost, often forcing many Indigenous Peoples who live on-reserve and in rural areas to choose these cheaper but unhealthier foods.

A 2022 study by Shafiee et al. found that a “lack of availability of both traditional and market foods is highlighted among Inuit and First Nation communities. Economic disadvantages, high food prices, and lack of access to transportation are major factors affecting the accessibility pillar of food security. Major factors affecting the utilization pillar of food security are the loss of traditional knowledge and skills, lack of knowledge on market foods, low quality of market foods, and food safety issues. Climate change has affected all 4 pillars of food security among Indigenous peoples. These findings suggest that resolving food insecurity issues among Indigenous peoples in Canada, especially those living in remote communities, requires a culturally specific integrated approach targeting food availability, food cost, food knowledge, food safety, and food quality.”

Diabetes Inequalities among First Nations

Due to multiple factors, such as limited healthy foods, lack of access to equal healthcare, and systemic racism, First Nation communities and individuals face increased health issues and conditions compared to the non-First Nation population. A report by Regine Halseth on the health disparities of First Nations found that:

• First Nation individuals living on-reserve have 3x greater instances of diabetes, and those living off-reserve have 2x greater instances.

• Rates of diabetes are rapidly increasing compared to the non-First Nation Canadian population,

  • The onset is earlier in life, and the prevalence is rapidly increasing in First Nation children and youth.

• First Nation women are also impacted at much higher rates than non-First Nation women,

  • This includes gestational diabetes that occurs during pregnancy, posing risks for both mothers and their babies born to women with gestational diabetes.

• Added to this, the systemic racism that First Nation individuals, families, and communities experience in hospitals and the health care system, along with the subpar care they already receive for diabetes, a First Nation person living with diabetes on-reserve is more likely to face significant and even fatal complications from their diabetes.

Lack of access to traditional foods and other sources of healthy foods greatly contributes to health issues faced by First Nations.

Current non-Indigenous diets vary greatly from those of our ancestors, and our bodies are not designed to process the high amounts of sugars, starches, and saturated fats.

Why Food Sovereignty for First Nations?

Indigenous food sovereignty is a vital and culturally grounded response to the systemic food insecurity faced by many First Nation communities, particularly those living on-reserve and in rural areas. These communities are often situated in food deserts, where healthy, nutritious foods, especially traditional foods, are scarce, expensive, or inaccessible, while low-cost, highly processed foods dominate local markets.

This limited access, compounded by economic disadvantages, climate change, and the loss of traditional food knowledge, undermines all pillars of food security: availability, access, utilization, and stability. As a result, communities experience heightened rates of diet-related illnesses such as diabetes, which now affect First Nation individuals, particularly women and youth, at rates significantly higher than the non-Indigenous population.

Food sovereignty offers a pathway to reclaim health and well-being by re-establishing relationships with land-based practices, traditional food systems, and Indigenous knowledge.

Food Sovereignty for First Nations emphasizes the right of Indigenous peoples to define and control their own food systems in ways that are culturally meaningful, nutritionally beneficial, and environmentally sustainable, countering the ongoing impacts of colonialism and systemic inequities in both health and food access.