Culturally Driven Monitoring: The Importance of Traditional Ecological Knowledge Indicators in Understanding Aquatic Ecosystem Change in the Northwest Territories’ Dehcho Region

Abstract

There is growing concern about the sustainability of freshwater ecosystems in northern Canada that are under significant stress from climate change, resource development, and hydroelectric development, among others. Community-based monitoring (CBM) based on traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) has the potential to contribute to understanding impacts on the environment and community livelihoods. This paper shares insights about culturally driven monitoring, through collaborative research with Kátł’odeeche First Nation (KFN) in the Northwest Territories. This research was initiated in 2018 to improve understanding of the changes occurring in the Hay River and Buffalo River sub-basins, which extend primarily across the Alberta and Northwest Territories borders. Drawing on 15 semi-structured interviews conducted with KFN elders, fish harvesters, and youth, this paper illustrates the kinds of social–ecological indicators used by KFN to track changes in the health of aquatic systems as well as the fishing livelihoods of local people. Utilizing indicators, fishers observe declines in fish health, water quality, water quantity, and ice thickness in their lifetime. Community members perceive these changes to be a result of the cumulative effects of environmental stressors. The indicators as well as trends and patterns being observed and experienced can contribute to both social learning in the community as well as the governance of the larger Mackenzie River Basin.

In a Good Way: Braiding Indigenous and Western Knowledge Systems to Understand and Restore Freshwater Systems

“…Dale [67] describes being able to discuss and co-create research objectives and goals with the community contact because of early engagement. Similarly, several projects co-developed project objectives with communities to ensure that the project was responsive to the communities' needs (e.g., [101,128,130,150]). Although early involvement is important, Lukawiecki et al [77] remind us that just because community members are engaged early in the project does not mean engagement ends once the project objectives are established.…”

“…Lowitt et al's [126] intercultural team collaborated to identify key themes for analyzing interviews. Similarly, Plummer et al[127] collaborated to evaluate indicators on a co-developed scale, identify indicator thresholds, and determine appropriate weights for a water vulnerability assessment (also see Middleton et al[128], Marshall et al[70], Satterfield et al[129], Stenekes et al[130], Straka et al[118], and Strangway et al[131]). Cont.…”

Towards more inclusive and solution orientated community-based environmental monitoring

“…Youth engagement is a unifying theme across the TCCRP, the AIP and Nuna. It has been common for youth to take on lead roles as coordinators to oversee CBM efforts when researchers are not present in communities (Peacock et al 2012, Kouril et al 2016, and there have been calls for youth to be engaged in Arctic research more widely (Brook et al 2009, Gérin-Lajoie et al 2018, Pedersen et al 2020, Stenekes et al 2020, Wong et al 2020. Knowledge documentation efforts that contribute to educational materials including maps, imagery and different knowledge based lesson plans can help facilitate knowledge transfer between elders and youth (Laidler et al 2008).…”

Toward productive complicity: Applying ‘traditional ecological knowledge’ in environmental science

“…TEK is considered to be different from western scientific knowledge (e.g. Sotero et al, 2020; Stenekes et al, 2020), although the extent to which this is the case is a matter for empirical investigation (e.g. Cebrián-Piqueras et al, 2020; see also Berkes, 2018: 13).…”