Community Empowerment in Health Impact Assessment By Roy E. Kwiatkowski IAIA’07

1. Community Empowerment in Health Impact Assessment By Roy E. Kwiatkowski IAIA’07

2. Aboriginal Observations Regarding EIA/HIA • Does not shed light on the forces that drive health determinants • Has a top-down emphasis on expert knowledge • Does not meet the immediate health and social information needs of indigenous peoples • What’s Needed – Inclusive EIA not Exclusive EIA

3. Aboriginal Observations Regarding EIA/HIA • Indigenous people continue to rely heavily on the environment for their subsistence, including their soical, cultural, spiritual, economic and physical survival • EIA is often performed without understanding indigenous needs and interests • Indigenous people want to take on a more active role in addressing their own environmental concerns – issues of resources and capacity hinder their efforts

4. Health Canada’s Response to Resource and Capacity Challenge 1. Canadian Handbook on HIA www.hc-sc.gc.ca/ewh-semt/pubs/eval.index_e.html 2. Web-Based Training courses Managers Intro to HIA HIA for the Mining Sector (Fall 2007) www.machaon.fmed.ulaval.ca/medicne/hia/home.asp

5. Resource and Capacity Challenge Cont. 3. First Nations Environmental Contaminants Program Jointly administered with First Nations University of Canada and Assembly of First Nations 4. Regional First Nations Environmental Contaminants Program Jointly administered with Regional staff and First Nations Communities 5. Northern Contaminants Program Jointly administered with territorial government, federal departments and aboriginal organizations

6. Aboriginal RA Model Structure

7. Community Knowledge & Perspectives • Research that utilizes cognitive mapping as a methodology for incorporating First Nations perspectives and local community knowledge into environmental assessment and management. • Provides graphical representations of the relationships between elements of an issue as perceived by “experts” and First Nations people.

8. Fuzzy Cognitive Mapping /

9. CommunityKnowledge & Perspectives • Goal of our work is to determine: • (a) if the conventional science-based view incorporated any or all of the First Nations view; and, • (b) if the inclusion of the First Nations perspective would suggest different management actions or policies.

10. HC’s HIA Research Priniciples • 1. A commitment to multi-disciplinary research and action • 2. The necessity of community participation, from research design, to decision-making and policy change, to practical application and evaluation • 3. Equity, which includes gender equity, and social, political and economic fairness.