VISION

Our vision is for our Nations to work together to ensure our grandchildren’s grandchildren have the opportunity to engage in traditional practices within a healthy Seal River Watershed.

We serve as guardians of the lands, waters, medicines, animals and caribou, when we hunt, fish, speak our languages, and honour our spiritual connection to our traditional territory.


SRWA VALUES

Respect the land, water, animals and each other's people and culture

  • Honouring the caribou, and animal that connects all our Nations and guide our work

  • Giving special consideration to the water crossings, river and creeks, that are connected to the Seal River

  • Conserving these natural gifts of the Creator for the future generations

  • Engaging with each other in good faith

Honour the traditional origin stories, teachings and laws of the elders and sacred sites

  • Using the origin stories and elders’ teachings as the basis of interaction of our Nations

  • Ensuring the traditional teachings are fundamental to the collective conservation plans

  • Protecting the sacred sites includes gathering sites and archeology sites used by our people and our ancestors in the Seal River Watershed

  • Documenting and re-establishing the traditional travel routes that bind us

Preserve our unique languages

  • Learning from our elders and teaching our children the traditional languages that we received as gifts from Creator

  • To respect our unique languages and encourage others while we are learning

  • To honour our languages as we continue our work together

Empower the youth of our Nations

  • Hearing and respecting the voices of our young people in the Seal River Watershed

  • Ensuring our Youth and Elders have every opportunity to share and learn from each other

Honour the rights and responsibilities of our Nations

  • Respecting the harvesting rights as laid out in the treaties

  • Remembering the responsibilities to care for the land, as set out by our ancestors

  • Sharing information and our activities with each other regularly

Foster the value of culturally based economies

  • Engage in economic endeavors that maintain respect for healthy lands and waters

  • Limiting industrial interests in favour of healthy environment

  • Sharing the watershed through joint stewardship efforts

Our Nations are joining together in the spirit of cooperation and mutual respect.

EXPECTED OUTCOMES

Establish a protected area through Indigenous leadership.
-
Protect the wintering grounds of the Beverly and Qamanirjuaq caribou herds.
-
Advance reconciliation by developing Indigenous capacity for management and stewardship of traditional lands.
-
Uphold and respect Indigenous rights and traditional activities.
-
Preserve and enhance regional Indigenous cultures.
-
Spur sustainable economic development, with a focus on cultural and eco-tourism.

COOPERATIVE RELATIONSHIP

Seal River Watershed &
Ancestral Lands Protected Area

Agreement In Principle (AIP) BETWEEN:
SAYISI DENE FIRST NATION AND:
NORTHLANDS DENE NATION AND:
BARREN LANDS FIRST NATION AND:
O-PIPON-NA-PIWIN CREE NATION

In this AIP, our Nations are joining together in the spirit of cooperation and mutual respect. We are joining together so that we may support each other and work together in our shared vision of protecting part of our respective Nations ancestral lands and resources from all industrial development. These lands have been and always will be within our respective ancestral territories.

Our Nations share a common goal of governing and protecting the Seal River watershed and other yet-to-be-determined ancestral lands and our resources. We will work in the spirit of cooperation and collaboration with other Nations, other governments, and the larger society.

We recognize our respective responsibilities to protect and care for the Seal River watershed and the yet-to-be-determined ancestral territories. This is an opportunity to address protected area concerns of our Nations and the larger societies in Manitoba, Canada, and internationally.  It also represents a unique and internationally significant opportunity to demonstrate the value our collective Indigenous knowledge in protecting and taking care of the land in the spirit of cooperation and harmony with other Nations, other governments and the larger society.

Given our shared desire to protect the Seal River Watershed and its resources, we agree to work together as follows:

Terms of Agreement in Principle

  1. We commit to working cooperatively and collectively with each other and with other Nations, other governments and the larger society to pursue the shared objective of protecting the Seal River Watershed and other ancestral lands (to be determined) from all industrial development.

  2. We commit to governing and protecting our resources and growing sustainable economies that will benefit our communities.

  3. This AIP will respect and honour Treaty and Aboriginal Rights and responsibilities.

  4. This AIP shall respect our teachings, values, customs and protocols.

  5. We agree that other Indigenous Nations in our area will be most welcome to join in our cooperative effort.

  6. The area is identified on a map attached as Schedule A.

We solemnly seek continued gifts of good guidance and strength from the Creator and our Ancestors in our efforts to work together.

Seal River Watershed - Indigenous And Protected