ID: 1503
Presenting Author: Chris Joseph
Session: 686 - Climate Change Impact Assessment: Countering Misinformation with Science
Status: pending
The Gitanyow climate test is a means for this Indigenous people in Canada to assert sovereignty over their traditional territory and attempt to address the climate crisis.
Beginning in 2023, the Gitanyow Hereditary Chiefs have been building upon their 2021 Wilp Sustainability Assessment process for major projects by developing a multi-component ‘climate test’. The Gitanyow are an Indigenous people in western Canada, and the climate test further affirms Gitanyow sovereignty over major project development affecting their traditional territory. The test has now been applied to two proposed projects – the Eskay Creek gold-silver mine, and the Ksi Lisims LNG export project – and the results are being used alongside other outputs of the Wilp process to inform Gitanyow decision making and discussions with project proponents and colonial governments. The Wilp process and the climate test are part of a broader trend of Indigenous people taking greater control over major project development but also an attempt to fill a persistent gap in impact assessment with respect to addressing the climate crisis. Around the world, impact assessment has struggled to effectively examine projects’ climate implications, and in this light the Gitanyow climate test demonstrates a means to examine issues at the intersection of impact assessment, climate, and Indigenous reconciliation.
Chris Joseph is an impact assessment practitioner and researcher. Dr. Joseph is Principal of Swift Creek Consulting based in western Canada.
Coauthor 1: Tara Marsden / Naxginkw