The Treaty Land Sharing Network grassroots group encourages supportive relationships between rural land owners and First Nation peoples, and a step toward reconciliation. (Photo submitted/Valerie Zink)

By Angela Brown

Honouring treaties

Farmers and Indigenous land users form new Treaty Land Sharing Network in Saskatchewan

Jul 16, 2021 | 9:54 AM

A number of farmers and Indigenous land users across Saskatchewan are joining in a new Treaty Land Sharing Network just formed.

About 20 farmers, ranchers, and other landholders from the North Battleford area to the Regina area signed on as members to honour Canada’s treaty relationship of sharing the land with Indigenous peoples and welcoming them to practise their traditional way of life.

Producer Mary Smillie whose farm borders on Treaty 4 and Treaty 6 property near Davidson, Sask., is among those involved in promoting the network.

She hosted the Treaty Land Sharing Network launch event at her family’s grain and livestock farm in Bladworth on July 15, that included guest speakers, Bradley Desjarlais, a hunter from Fishing Lake First Nation, and Treaty Commissioner of Saskatchewan, Mary Culbertson. More farmers signed on to the network at the event.

Smillie and her husband Ian McCreary are among the producers who signed on as a member to allow Indigenous people access to their land with permissions.

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She said sees the initiative as a response to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Calls to Action, number 45, point 3: “Renew or establish treaty relationships based on principles of mutual recognition, mutual respect, and shared responsibility for maintaining those relationships into the future.”

She became interested in the project after attending a conference.

“I came to realize as a signatory to the treaties that my husband and I had the opportunity to share our land as the treaties intended,” Smillie told battlefordsNOW. “So when the Treaty Land Sharing Network invited me to join them, I said, ‘Yes, I really want to do that’.”

According to the group, with ongoing privatization of Crown land and stricter trespassing legislation, land access is becoming increasingly difficult for Indigenous people.

“Without access to land, we cannot exercise our inherent rights and meet the needs of our communities,” Bradley Desjarlais, a hunter and committee member of the Anishnabek Nation Treaty Authority, said in a release. “The Treaty Land Sharing Network is not only opening access to privately-held land, it is opening a possibility to build respectful and positive relationships based on the treaty principles of mutual respect and mutual benefit.”

Marcella Pedersen, with a Cut Knife area farm family, said she supports the network.

While she says she doesn’t have control over the property, she would consult with family members on a case-by-case basis if Indigenous people request to access the land.

She appreciates the concept of the network as a way to bridge and improve relationships between settlers and First Nation peoples.

Pedersen said in the past the family has received requests to access the property on occasion to hunt deer, and have given their consent.

“It’s mainly to foster good relationships,” she told battlefordsNOW. “We sort of take it case by case. I believe we are on good terms with First Nations peoples.”

Alexis Christensen, Battlefords Agency Tribal Chiefs (BATC) Director of Operations, is supportive of the network to promote treaty as a land-sharing effort.

“I don’t think it could be any better,” she said of the project. “I think it’s brilliant.”

Christensen said the network reminds her of a situation previously when a rural family contacted the Indigenous organization after finding some connection to the past.

“We spent time on a farmer’s land two years ago in the RM of Winslow because as they were building a road through. They uncovered artifacts,” she told battlefordsNOW. “There was teepee rings and teepee circles there… The farmers reached out to us and we were able to look at some of the artifacts. Afterwards, they invited us to their house for lunch.”

Christensen hopes the Treaty Land Sharing Network can continue to encourage positive relationships between First Nation peoples and rural land owners. She said BATC strongly supports this type of relationship-building initiative.

Details about the locations of the network are available on the new Treaty-Land Sharing Network website.

Farms and ranches within the Treaty Land Sharing Network may be accessed for gathering plants and medicines, hunting, and holding ceremonies. Additional uses may be discussed with landholders as well.

“We are committed to implementing the treaty relationship, engaging in ongoing learning together as we practice being treaty people, and establishing a different way forward for rural Saskatchewan,” the network says on its website.

Treaty Land Sharing Network participating farmers will have signs posted on their property. An Indigenous land user is asked to follow a number of protocols. The individual must contact the land owners before the initial visit, so they can provide information to ensure everyone stays safe. Land access is by foot only. Gates and fences must be left as they are found. Open fires are not permitted unless agreed to in advance.

According to the guiding principles of the grassroots network, Indigenous people hold “both inherent and treaty rights to move freely throughout these territories and to use and steward the plants and animals.” The group says access to land is critical for the “cultural survival and livelihood of Indigenous people.”

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Angela.Brown@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @battlefordsnow