Indigenous Relations and Land Trusts

At ACLT, we acknowledge and thank Indigenous Peoples who have been the guardians of the land since time immemorial and continue to lead in land care today. Our Indigenous Relations work is grounded in the belief that meaningful conservation must also advance decolonization, cultural respect, and Indigenous leadership and self-determination. This page offers an overview of our efforts and reflections in three parts:

Guiding respectful partnerships with Indigenous Peoples.

We are on a journey together: one that calls for humility, learning and a shared commitment to the land and each other.

ACLT’s Commitment to Indigenous Communities and Conservation

ACLT is commited to fostering meaningful relationships with Indigenous communities and supporting Indigenous-led conservation.

This commitment is grounded in practice through ACLT’s Indigenous Relations Working Group and Indigenous Relations Program. These initiatives work in tandem to support Indigenous-led conservation efforts and foster stronger relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous land trusts across the country.

Indigenous Relations Working Group

Indigenous Relations Program

• Support for Indigenous Land Trusts (ILTs); and,
• Support for other land trusts to engage, learn and collaborate in right relations with Indigenous communities and organizations where they work.

Supporting Indigenous Land Trusts

Supporting Non-Indigenous Land Trusts

• Conducts research, lifts up stories of relationship and collaboration, draws attention to past impacts, explores new ways to work together, and helps enable land return.
• Reviews and advocates at the federal level for better programs, incentives and laws to enhance the effectiveness of land trusts in their community-based missions.
• Supports, with the provincial alliances, training and discussions within the land trust community toward being in right relations with Indigenous peoples and the land, recognizing that we are all at different points of this journey.

For more information about ACLT’s Indigenous Relations Program, contact ACLT’s Indigenous Engagement Facilitator, Ian Attridge at iancattridge@gmail.com.

Indigenous-Led Land Trusts: Reclaiming Land and Responsibilities

Indigenous peoples across lands now known as Canada continue to assert and reclaim their responsibilities and relationships with lands, waters, and all beings, as well as their own cultures, languages, and spiritualities. This is part of a wider resistance and resurgence of Indigenous peoples in response to centuries of colonization.

What are Indigenous-Led Land Trusts (ILTs)?

To reclaim land-based relationships, some Indigenous communities have decided to explore the land trust model and form an Indigenous-led land trust (ILT).
An ILT is an organization where the form, purposes, and activities are established and operated by Indigenous people, including holding and caring for lands.
Similar yet unique: ILTs may be somewhat like other land trusts but are tailored to the priorities and concepts of that Indigenous Nation or community.
These goals might include ecological conservation, cultural revitalization and learning, sacred spaces and ceremony, healing, and possibly growing food or housing capacity.

What are Indigenous-Led Land Trusts (ILTs)?

To reclaim land-based relationships, some Indigenous communities have decided to explore the land trust model and form an Indigenous-led land trust (ILT).
An ILT is an organization where the form, purposes, and activities are established and operated by Indigenous people, including holding and caring for lands.
Similar yet unique: ILTs may be somewhat like other land trusts but are tailored to the priorities and concepts of that Indigenous Nation or community.
These goals might include ecological conservation, cultural revitalization and learning, sacred spaces and ceremony, healing, and possibly growing food or housing capacity.

ILTs in Canada: Current Status

The first Indigenous Land Trust in what is now called Canada was formed over a dozen years ago. Today, there are about a dozen ILTs, with more being explored or in the process of forming. These organizations are often not-for-profit corporations and registered charities that receive, use, and care for gifted lands.

Why Are ILTs Important?

Fundamentally, an ILT can foster the return of land to Indigenous communities, bringing people and land together into a renewed relationship. This is particularly so when communities have been disconnected from those lands, waters and other beings through colonization, displacement, privatization, and other barriers. An ILT can be part of the solution and support the journey towards reclaiming land-based learning, culture, language, kinship, and spirit.

Challenges Within a Colonial Context

The land trust model operates within a colonial context of private property, corporations, tax, funding, and other state laws (such as the Indian Act). This is a foreign and hard to navigate system for most Indigenous communities, with worldview differences and legal and practical limitations. In time, ILTs may well need to evolve into something more as understandings, relationships, and laws decolonize over time.

Collaborating with Indigenous Communities

If you are a land trust looking to build meaningful relationships with Indigenous Peoples, it’s essential to integrate Indigenous knowledge, perspectives, and leadership from the very beginning. Indigenous communities have been caring for lands and waters since time immemorial, and their knowledge systems offer invaluable guidance for more sustainable, relational, and just conservation practices.

While the growth of the land trust movement in what is now called Canada has helped protect large areas of land, it has also often reinforced colonial conservation models : ones that separate people from nature and restrict Indigenous Peoples’ access to their ancestral territories (Mno Aki; MDPI).
Today, Indigenous leadership is central to addressing climate change and ecological crises, and Indigenous-led land trusts (ILTs) are great ways to foster land return, self-determination, healing, and cultural resurgence.

As a non-Indigenous land trust, engaging with Indigenous communities requires time, care, and humility. This is not a checklist. It’s a long-term commitment grounded in relationship and respect.

Here are a few starting points to consider:

• Learn whose land you’re on. Take time to understand the Nation(s) whose territory you work within
• Build genuine relationships based on listening, transparency, and trust
• Research local treaties, legal claims, and territorial assertions in your area
• Consult resources on best practices for respectful Indigenous engagement
• Create space for Indigenous leadership in ways defined by the communities themselves

Engagement with Indigenous Peoples should never be an afterthought. It must be embedded at every stage of your land conservation work, from vision and planning to stewardship and governance, to ensure that your efforts honour Indigenous knowledge systems and contribute to healing and land justice.