Report outlines basics for self-sufficiency

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The Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business has worked out a set of recommendations for economic development which could help Native communities become self-sufficient and self-governing.

"It is obvious that we need immediate change and progress to allow Aboriginal Canadians to reclaim their pride, heritage and self-determining status," said Patrick Lavelle, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the CCAB.

To foster economic development, Aboriginal communities must be able to use their land as collateral to finance ventures, the CCAB report reads. This means the resolution of land claims and the establishment Aboriginal rights to the land.

But not all Aboriginal people and communities are in agreement on this point; many are afraid of losing their land if financial ventures fail.

"That issue is at the heart of the debate taking place now," said Lavelle.

"The land issue has to be resolved. It is a stumbling block that I don't think it's one that can't be overcome."

There are ways to protect the land, Lavelle said. Investors could be insured to cover short-term defaults, for instance, so if land was mortgaged and the owner couldn't meet the payments, the insurance would kick in."

"There's all kinds of ways in which it can be done, except that ultimately the responsibility for the risk has to come down to the person taking the risk," Lavelle said.

Key recommendations of the report, presented last month to the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples include:

- Land claims, treaty violations and self-government must be progressively resolved in a fair and equitable manner, targeted for completion by Jan. 1, 2000. Treaties or future claims negotiations that have not been resolved by this date should be referred to a non-government dispute settlement mechanism which will arrive at binding decisions.

- A national Aboriginal Development Bank must be established immediately and capitalized by banks, private sector corporations and the Aboriginal communities. This bank must eventually be run by Aboriginal people who will receive the appropriate training and education over the course of this five-to-seven-year plan.

- The present minister of Indian Affairs should be the last. The next federal government should continue with the elimination of the Indian Act and the Department of Indian Affairs. A small, non-government publicly accountable commission - named the Aboriginal Opportunity Commission - should be created to oversee the dismantling of DIAND and the redistribution of DIAND funds. The monies may be directly delivered

to band and Aboriginal and community governments.

- Aboriginal communities must be established in federal tax legislation tax tax-free opportunity and development zones.

- An Aboriginal Trade Commission should be established to foster and promote the trade of goods and services offered by Aboriginal businesses.

- An educational centre of excellence, built on the basis of the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College, should be given full degree-granting status with a mandate to function as an Aboriginal special mission university.

- An Education Foundation must be established immediately to foster and promote the growth of a solid and relevant education infrastructure for the Aboriginal population.

Barriers to Aboriginal economic development in Canada are still firmly rooted in the policy and legislative framework established by the Indian Act, the CCAB's report reads.

With a few exceptions, only those nations with adequate community infrastructure already existing - usually those close to urban centres - have been able to move beyond the Act's provisions. The majority remain confined within the cycle of poverty and dependence imposed by the Act and the system it perpetuates.

The Department of Indian and Northern Affairs is the portfolio established to "fulfill the obligations of the federal government arising from...the Indian Act," according to DIAND's annual report for 1990-91. But DIAN spending patterns have been more in favor of administration and social assistance dollars than capital and business development programs, the report states.

Approximations of DIAND estimates (per capita 1988-89) show the amount

spent on administration is 20 per cent more than that spent on economic development

and almost 70 per cent more than that spent on housing.

"Inadvertently or not, DIAND has been supporting what is essentially a false economy on reserves," the report concludes.