Grainswest - Fall 2024

Fall 2024 Grains West 40 come with caveats that make them inaccessible to individual operators such as Breaker. In 2020, the province introduced legislation to set up the Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation (AIOC), a “first-of-its- kind Crown corporation to facilitate Indigenous investments and job creation.” While the AIOC is technically available to backstop loan guarantees for Indigenous agriculture projects, with a minimum $20 million spend on any given project, most of its support to date has been in the energy sector. “Unless you’re getting into a really big dairy farm, you’re not going to be getting into those sums,” admitted Rick Wilson, Alberta Minister of Indigenous Relations. He pointed to the Alberta Business Investment Fund (ABIF), which provides grants of between $150,000 and $750,000, as a better fit for capital support. He cited the Kainai Nation’s timothy hay operation as a project successfully supported by ABIF. The band used ABIF funding to build warehouses. “It’s the best hay in the world that they’re growing down there,” he said. “The Japanese use it for their dairy hay, and over in Dubai, they use it for their racehorses.” With such a reputation, Kainai hay fetches a premium. Wilson estimated the operation made close to $15 million in profit in 2023. There are many agricultural opportunities worth exploring, said Wilson, such as an additional ABIF- backed initiative launched by the Montana First Nation in central Alberta. Concerned about food security at the height of the pandemic, the band approached Wilson to back a high- tech hydroponic greenhouse to grow food for community use with extra product sold at regional farmers’ markets. The project was funded and has since expanded to include a modest commercial operation. Such projects mirror the opportunities Hester sees in Siksika’s future. In particular, she has high hopes for off- reserve land investments. In 2022, Siksika Nation and the federal government signed a $1.3 billion land claim settlement over the 1910 surrender. The agreement also allows for the purchase of 115,000 acres of land, some of which could be used for farming, she said. “There’s opportunity there.” The community, she added, must be seriously committed to completion of the necessary planning. This includes land-use plan, comprehensive community plan and capital infrastructure plan. “That sets the pace and direction in setting the stage for the next generation.” If this next generation is to include independent farmers, however, there’s much additional work to be done at the policy level. Funding support from the AIOC and ABIF is only available at the band level, which leaves individuals ineligible for grants. As such, Hester returns to the issue of land certainty. Until it is addressed once and for all, she said, there is no way forward. Before that can happen, she acknowledged, both reserve leadership and the community at large need to have a better understanding of the high input costs that are shouldered by farmers and ranchers. Without a land-use agreement, most will either pack it in or resort to buckshee. “That’s why some don’t make it,” she said. “They don’t have the collateral or what have you to even do one or two years of farming. They need cash upfront or some sort of loan to purchase equipment. I’ve had some discussions [with land users] and they said, ‘Well, I’m using the land. I’ll pay, and that way I’ve got some land certainty.’ Now, would that be at the band level or under the Indian Act? That’s yet to be determined. But either way, land certainty is the way to go.” As the system stands, though, Stewart can’t help but feel little has changed since the days in which success or failure were determined by the whims of the Indian agent. This historical figure, he said, has simply been replaced by contemporary bureaucracy. “We’re still under the Indian Act, politically and socially,” he said. “The only thing is that we still have are ceremonies and spirituality. That’s why we’re here. Nobody else.” A land claim settlement signed in 2022 may provide the Siksika Nation with agricultural opportunities but will require land-use planning. FEATURE