Transformation to a More Sustainable Future: The Role of Indigenous Wisdom A Presentation by the Ecoforestry Institute Society

The recent and ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, as frightening and impactful as it is, has given us an unusual opportunity to contemplate the impacts we humans have had on the environment and on other species of our planet. Our unsustainable habits – overuse of fossil fuels, destruction of diverse habitats from forests, to wetlands, to marine ecosystems, over harvesting, and overuse of pesticides and plastics, to name some of the most impacting – have resulted from ignoring Nature’s needs and processes and giving priority to our economic systems over the environmental systems on which we absolutely depend. We need to transform our lifeways, to recognize and respect the gifts that Nature provides us with, and to consider the needs of other species as well as our own, in our behaviors, actions and governance systems.

Indigenous Peoples worldwide embody perspectives that are more environment-centric, and they have much wisdom and knowledge developed over generations of building relationships with their home places and the other species on which they depend. Many hold a “kincentric” view of the world, in which other species, and even rivers and mountains, are regarded as generous relatives. In return for their gifts to us as humans, we humans cannot take them for granted, but rather have reciprocal responsibilities to them, to look after their needs and not overexploit them.

Geraldine Manson, as an educator, a member of the Snuneymuxw Nation, and respected Elder in Residence at Vancouver Island University, will share her first-hand insights and perspectives on transformation and sustainability, and Nancy Turner, ethnobotanist and retired professor in Environmental Studies at University of Victoria, will describe some of the lessons she has learned from Indigenous knowledge keepers throughout British Columbia.