Indigenous fire stewardship enhances ecosystem diversity, assists with the management of complex resources, and reduces wildfire risk by lessening fuel loads. Although Indigenous Peoples have maintained fire stewardship practices for millennia and continue to be keepers of fire knowledge, significant barriers exist for re-engaging in cultural burning. Indigenous communities in Canada have unique vulnerabilities to large and high-intensity wildfires as they are predominately located in remote, forested regions and lack financial support at federal and provincial levels to mitigate wildfire risk. Therefore, it is critical to uphold Indigenous expertise in leading effective and socially just fire stewardship. In this perspective, we demonstrate the benefits of cultural burning and identify five key barriers to advancing Indigenous fire stewardship in Canada. We also provide calls to action to assist with reducing preconceptions and misinformation and focus on creating space and respect for different knowledges and experiences. Despite growing concerns over wildfire risk and agency-stated intentions to establish Indigenous Peoples as partners in wildfire management, power imbalances still exist. The future and coexistence with fire in Canada needs to be a shared responsibility and led by Indigenous Peoples within their territories.

After generations of fire-suppression policy, Indigenous fire management (IFM) is being reactivated as one way to mitigate wildfire in fire-prone ecosystems. Research has documented that IFM also mitigates carbon emissions, improves livelihoods and enhances well-being among participants. This study documents the goals of the Yunesit’in and Xeni Gwet’in First Nations as they develop a fire management program in central British Columbia, Canada. Drawing on goal setting theory and interviews, a qualitative coding and cluster analysis identified three general goals from fire management: (1) strengthen cultural connection and well-being, (2) restore the health of the land and (3) respect traditional laws. Sub-goals included enhancing community member health and well-being, improving fire management practices to maintain ‘pyrodiversity’ and food security and re-empowering Indigenous laws and practices. This community-developed framework will guide program evaluation and brings insight to a theory of IFM.

In the face of ongoing Canadian colonialism and displacement, blockading has become an important tactic through which Indigenous communities reassert their traditional forms of place-based culture and governance. This chapter will examine three important reclamation sites in Canada over the past twenty five years, ranging from the spontaneous and relatively-short lived blockades of the Oka Crisis near the Kanesatake and Kahnawake Mohawk reserves in Quebec (1990), through the long-term Anishinaabe anti-clearcutting blockade at Grassy Narrows in northern Ontario (begun in 2002), to the growing and evolving anti-pipeline reclamation site in Unist’ot’en territory, in the British Columbia interior, which began in 2009. These three sites can reveal important lessons about Indigenous resurgence and the efficacy of protest camps as reoccupations of stolen land.

Yunesit’in First Nation is reclaiming fire stewardship after generations of suppression. Applying a “learning by doing” approach, Yunesit’in members plan and implement proactive fire practices to the landscape, which are low intensity cool burn fires driven by the needs of the landscape and community goals. Through a structured monitoring and evaluation process, the participants generate knowledge and science on fire stewardship; the outcomes are documented and mobilized in various ways, including video, photos, and peer-reviewed articles. The pilot program has initially been evaluated through four general measures: area stewarded (in hectares); people employed and trained (number and diversity of people employed); the level of planning, vision, and program sustainability (generating plans where fire is a tool to meet the goals in these plans, supported by carbon funds); and partnerships and knowledge mobilization, (fostering partnerships for knowledge production and mobilization). On these measures, the program is growing and is a success. A holistic framework is being developed by the community, which encompasses ecological, social, economic, and cultural indicators, including a health and wellbeing evaluation framework to assess the physical, mental health and wellbeing benefits for participants in the program. A holistic approach is critical for understanding the connection between people, place and the role that fire stewardship plays in mediating positive outcomes.

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