Regina Food Stakeholder Gathering: Okâwîmâwaskiy, Reciprocity & Food Sovereignty

May was a busy month, with facilitators from Righting Relations Canada and the John Humphrey Centre for Peace and Human Rights hosting two full-day gatherings with food stakeholders, including indigenous elders, health educators, advocates, community-based grassroots organizations, faith-based groups, and many others working in areas related to food security coming together in both Regina and Winnipeg to discuss strengthening their work and moving forward the Calls to Action built from reports released in Spring 2022. 

In Regina, an intimate and committed group came together on May 5, 2023, to discuss the Calls to Action that were released in the Saskatchewan Agenda 2030 Food Security Report and the challenges being faced by community organizations and those utilizing these resources. Some of the biggest Calls to Action that resonated with folks included the need for Guaranteed Basic Income as the cost of housing, food and inflation takes it toll, the need to Educate, Advocate, & Empower through accessible education and programming, Strengthening Land Protection to ensure access to grow food and preservation of traditional practices, wild game and plants. As competition and absence of funding limits efforts, the need for Mutual Aid and Collaboration is also an important piece to move forward.

We are grateful to Kokum Faye Sioux-John for grounding us and for the many inspiring stories shared throughout the day. We were also thrilled that Joely BigEagle-Kequahtooway, educator and co-owner of Buffalo People Art Institute, was able to share her experience and skills as an artist to create a piece to commemorate the day!

Image Description: A woman’s figure with long, flowing curly hair down to their waist is portrayed, with the topics of conversation that came up during the Regina Food Gathering gathered in voice bubbles that arise from the person’s mouth. The images show images of the land, water, plants, food and animals, including a moose, goose, vegetables, berries, fish, etc. At the center of it all is a large, focal image of the Buffalo. The background is of a blue sky and field with plants coming up.

Joely recently shared some of her vision and inspiration for the artwork created from the May 5 gathering with us:

I guess I wanted to add the female image of this person. She is mother earth. She is us. I made her like she is made of the stars. Because a lot of our origin stories say we came from the stars.  We come from the stars and so on her body… you know, there is this sun colour, right? She's otherworldly. And she has these star images on her body that are not, you know, might not be visible and that maybe part of it. So it is that nod to the origin story… in order for us to know where we are going in the future we need to know of our past.

And you know, when you think about food sovereignty in the Prairies, I think about some of the traditional foods that we have and how they revolve around Buffalo. When you talk about the more holistic way of indigenization or decolonization, you know at the core of that, discussion is returning the Buffalo to the land. Or Bison. I prefer Buffalo. When we talk about the word Buffalo and so you know, with the Buffalo, there'll be also talk about…what's happening with our land right now and climate change.

We’re really looking at some of the traditional foods…such as wild onions, wild turnips, you know? And even like the return of Salmon and Moose, Deer, Elk and even the essential, you know, need for water.  You need to include that in this discussion on [the] topic of food sovereignty, because without water you cannot grow. You know it's about that, the wealth of the soil…and access to water. It's about wild animals. It's about wild food, right? So, whether that's… the Saskatoon berries…the choke cherries, some of the food, the original food, of the Prairies [and] how they still sustain us today.

So, during our feasts, you know we'll have chokecherry jam or after a fast. You know, people will say have some choke cherries that they squish together, and you eat it, and it is good for your system to cleanse. Right. And also to make sure that your body [reacts] negatively when you do it fast, right? So they make chokecherry patties. and make Waskna something called pemmican. Waskna is dried Buffalo jerky that is ground up mixed with dried berries that is mixed up with buffalo fat or animal fat. And that was the original protein bar of this land. And we still make that. But it's really specialized…we’ll just have it for special occasions….we see it as beef jerky or bison jerky, right?

What is the earth giving us? So the representation of Bushi Maka okâwîmâwaskiy - mother earth - is this golden light so, she's giving everything to us. But it's also representation of us and how we're also taking it in. So, to be very female centric poster you know and it's about the matrilineal society and let's have a discussion of what that means for you following the matrilineal society and following the natural law. Let us listen to mother earth let us listen Bushi Maka. What is she saying? Is she sick? Or are we causing her to be sick? Right, so what are we putting in her and what is she sending out to us? And so it's that reciprocal relationship. She gives but we also take. In the image there are all these traditional foods that we might say, “Yes that’s a meal” or “No that is not a meal but these could be a meal.” But it is not just about potatoes, and a meat, and a vegetable.  But it is about these traditional plants that sustain the land too. And help to make the land healthy. So, to me that is the beginning of the discussion of food sovereignty.

So in the background of the female figure are these plants. So if you want to return the buffalo to the land - the buffalo need to eat too, so those are natural grasses and the prairies have the highest natural grasslands but it is also deteriorating rapidly. So you can’t bring the Buffalo back to the land if they don’t have any food to eat,  and we want those Buffalo to be as wild as possible. We don’t want to domesticate them. The wilder they are, the better the meat. So, if we buy or purchase or eat that meat…then it nourishes us in a better way rather than domesticating them and formalizing-you know, making a formula so that they become so commercialized. They end up becoming too commercialized right when they start to feed them steroids or antibiotics. Add whatever fattening up their meat so that they can get more for/from them. All of that has been unhealthy. Right. So, it's not a good consumer model. The best is to leave the wild, wild, where there is food you know - the Buffalo, deer, the moose, the fish.  And how can we make it a sustainable food model when we think of it that way, right?

So, I think [of] the Three Sisters, I mean the three sisters are there - corn, beans and squash. And that model of gardening, right. So, you don't just have a monoculture. Our agricultural development, we plant the corn, beans and squash together because they help each other to grow. One provides nitrogen, one provides shade, so it's about, you know, diversity. So, I highlighted that in the image as well. Food sovereignty is about diversity in how they could help each other to grow, which is a great message to share when we're talking about food sovereignty…”

Joely BigEagle-Kequahtooway

Missed our other blog posts about the other Food Stakeholder Gatherings we’ve held this year? Read them here:

To get involved in Righting Relations Circles, Change Labs or for other questions around the Food Security Reports, contact our local coordinators:

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