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CONTENT

Lead Article

Radical Partnership
by Ferananda Ibarra

Article 01

Indigenous peoples across the globe are uniquely equipped to deal with the climate crisis - so why are we being left out of these conversations
by Janine Mohamed, Pat Anderson and Veronica Matthews, University of Sydney

The Future Now Show

Indigenous Values
with Peachie Dioquino-Valera

Article 02

Indigenous Fashion

News about the Future

> Aquadrone that removes plastics
> A fabric that “hears” your heart's sounds

Article 03

Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change

Recommended Book

Me Tomorrow: Indigenous Views on the Future
by Drew Hayden Taylor

Article 04

Indigenous Food

Climate Change Success Story

Regenerative Resources

Futurist Portrait

Jason Edward Lewis
Hawaiian and Samoan digital media theorist, poet, and software designer

Tags:
Aboriginal peoples, AI, Australia, Canada, Climate Change, Digital Media,
Fashion, First Nations, FOOD, Ghana, Indigenous Melanesian people,
Indigenous Values, Inuit, Lakota, Maasai, Mexico, Mitakuye Oyasin,
Namibia, Plastic, Regenerative Agriculture, SDGs, Sioux, Spain, Waste







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Peachie Dioquino-Valera: " Indigenous Spiritualist Knowledge is a way of articulating the tribal protected areas factored in the realm of natural resource management. This is why Indigenous Peoples’ explicit and implicit knowledge is said to be the key to solving the Climate Crisis, Biodiversity Loss, and even the growing violence and greed spurred by the capitalistic and extractive global mindset. "

Jason Edward Lewis: "The concept of the future imaginary seeks to capture the ways people imagine the futures of their societies. In Indigenous contexts we often refer to the seventh generation to keep us mindful of how our actions in the present will affect our descendants."

Drew Hayden Taylor: “I’ve spent too many years explaining who and what I am repeatedly, so as of this moment I officially secede from both races. I plan to start my own separate nation. Because I am half Ojibway and half Caucasian, we will be called the Occasions. And of course, since I’m founding the new nation, I will be a Special Occasion.”



Indigenous Peoples at the United Nations

"Indigenous peoples are inheritors and practitioners of unique cultures and ways of relating to people and the environment. They have retained social, cultural, economic and political characteristics that are distinct from those of the dominant societies in which they live. Despite their cultural differences, indigenous peoples from around the world share common problems related to the protection of their rights as distinct peoples.

Indigenous peoples have sought recognition of their identities, way of life and their right to traditional lands, territories and natural resources for years, yet throughout history, their rights have always been violated. Indigenous peoples today, are arguably among the most disadvantaged and vulnerable groups of people in the world. The international community now recognizes that special measures are required to protect their rights and maintain their distinct cultures and way of life."

Lead Article

Radical Partnership
by Ferananda Ibarra

 

 

We begin with this quote: Diversity asks, Who is at the table? Equity replies, who is not at the table? And what barriers do they face in order to get here? Inclusion asks, Has everyone's ideas been heard? And then justice replies -Have ideas be taken seriously if they're not part of the majority? A great quote but it's still centers on whiteness. Because decolonization asks, Who built the table? Why was it built? ~ Modern warrior

 

You have been invited to an “all inclusive circle”, one that honors all yet heightens those who have been disfranchised, neglected into the shadows and edges of society. The indigenous, the women, the waters. You have been invited to find larger meaning and connection. To explore Radical Partnership in an “Ancient Futures Café”. To co-create radical partnership for the 100%.

You are focused, present to the room, to others, connected through the heart. Women from different walks of life and the Indigenous Grandmothers are holding the container with their wisdom of the most ancient social technologies; Intentions have been blown out in spirals into the winds, permissions have been granted, the spirits have been called forth with their native names, the water prayer, the High Priestess guided in the river, opened the emotional space, and you feel united through the waters of the Great Womb of life. Men holding the field move the inner and outer flows and allow for the feminine to dance in all its glory. Clearing and purification have been practiced. Your heart vibes to the rhythm of the collective body and you feel your great self-presence and inner listening.

Then it comes, the first spiral of questions:

How are you perpetuating patriarchy or privilege? Where are YOU enacting or enabling extractive behaviors?

Wait... Have I suddenly been asked to get naked? Asked to reveal my hidden behaviors and conditioning, to dismantle the self constructs I diligently learned?

Patriarchy has stopped the free flows and nutrients and life. It stopped the free flow of the energy of women. It has blocked the sacred purpose of at least 50% of the population, not to say mutilated multiple cultures and other species out of existence, for centuries. Yet perhaps the biggest damage is that it disrupted the possibility of generative partnerships and the field of love.

I notice that if I peel the layer of fear to be judged then there is a deep ocean of INquiry. Will you let the grief in? Will you let shame propel your evolution? Are you willing to open in raw vulnerability? Don’t judge me for my high or low tides, allow me to be me. Am I too blue for you?

As people open, the field experiences shifts. A river runs through us. Stories from grief and trauma float in the stream of our collective waters. Vulnerability is in the mix. Hide and Seek are present too. Our energy peaks rushing down into a whirl of e-motion. The Grandmother of love bursts into tears. From the edge of my chair I wonder -What have we done to offend her? Should I feel shame? Are we, am I colonizing the space, imposing an unwanted, unrequested emotional labour into our Grandmothers? Our indigenous elder, the one I appreciate and cherish, the one I hardly understand, has spoken through water.

There is a practice in holding space that is about “Being with all that Arises”

*Do you have the patience to wait
till your mud settles and the water is clear?
Can you remain unmoving
till the right action arises by itself?
The Master doesn’t seek fulfillment.
Not seeking, not expecting,
she is present, and can welcome all things.
– Lao Tsu*

It has been a dance with the field in the now. Ebb and Flow. The Grandmothers sit in circle. They listen. The tears are calling for the fire to be lit. When you tune to partnership with the natural elements they speak to you. Fire, our great companion that enables us to endure the intensity, the heat and the pressure we experience, fuels the deep transformative work to which we are committed to.

I repeat to myself - Stay conscious and practice containing and grounding the electricity that runs through us like lightning, seeking a target. Through the work with fire, we form the alchemical vessel in which deeper individual and collective transmutation can occur.

The spiral keeps moving in and the second set of questions comes in. We moved from the realms of the Self into Culture. Every one of us is a living organism that is alive to the energetic field of the others, and alive to the energetic field of the whole.

How can de-rooted people find community and re-plant themselves in an ethical way? What is the transitional ethics involved to integrate and define a new culture where we become indigenized into place? What does it mean to leave behind a culture of oppression? Who built the table? and why was it built?

Gift me a moment of unedited creative courage -You ask. A moment where you speak your mind, not hiding anything but opening your heart and mind completely to the other through discourse. Sincerity.

We each know about the potential that arises from sharing the innermost substance of consciousness within the Heart. We have placed our awareness in service of the whole. Able to speak truth and listen. Open to the winds of influence. Receptive, allowing.

The whole room breathes at a rapid pace, there is no way to hide. Who would want to hide anyways? Isn't this a sacred moment of Regeneration of culture through vulnerability and courage? The grandmothers whisper to our hearts. Be present. Be respectful. Be you. Dive in. Those open to receive radical truth, free and fierce love find connection to Self, Place and each other.

The indigenous cultures honor the ancestors in ways that others have forgotten. Its an invitation to being as the world together. Recognize in the other his/her/them true being, freedom and creativity. The indigenous remind us -No specie has the right to disrupt the sacred purpose of another specie. - Mine and thine, if you could only get rid of it! Polyculture is a word, a grammar, a vocabulary, a composition, and a creation. In an animate world the Ocean has a soul, it isn't a token for your rituals. The Fire has a divine purpose and a seat at the circle. The Wind communicates change and the Earth breathes through the lungs of the collective. The hum of our voices reveal the sensible engagement of those who are ready to release the old OS that has tied us to very narrow ways. How can we become better listeners to all the animate world?

If you are sitting in the circle and by now you havent received a self-revealing truth capable of transforming you, then you are probably busy editing.

Participation is key. Stop overthinking where to participate, walk the path and illuminate it. We aren’t getting “somewhere”, we are following the evolutionary impulse and we all have access to the now. Allow yourself to immerse in a new narrative that brings the best of us into the center, and thus creating a field of expansion of possibility, not for you, but all the generations to come” Thomas Hubl

To the above quote, I would add -In Radical Partnership participation is key. What is required is practicing a polyculture “aware way” of communicating, utilizing the strengths of every voice that partakes in a conversation and from that bringing information, direction, wisdom and illumination. Perception is participation, interplay. Offer to the ancestors all that wants to be released. Transmute the shadow. Metabolize our collective trauma into joy as we give ourselves the opportunity to move from -them- to WE.

What does it take to become the kind of human beings who can break through the stuck patterns of our social, political and economical systems to engender the transformation of human culture? I will certainly be chewing on that one for some time. Perhaps growth happens in between comfort and panic and move us into action.

(The community) is not a sum of individuals. The sum of individuals is not the community.
- Wendell Berry

Self, Culture and Nature are a representation of “The Big Three”, also known as I, WE, IT or The Good, The True and the Beautiful or Art, Morals and Science. The spirals of conversation in the Ancient Futures Cafe move us from the realm of Culture into the exploration of the realms Nature and the reality principle.

It's always an interesting question about where one has leverage. Seems as a very particular thing. Yet, when looking at large scale systems change in the universe, we can observe that it happens when a new expressive capacity shows up, an example of such a capacity is DNA. If we want to talk systems then we need to look at the grammar of DNA and social organisms like organizations, cities, even families. We need to look at living systems and understand flow. Isnt that what the indigenous have done all along? Oh well... we dismissed ancient wisdom for a couple of centuries, can we rewind? and there is also a next level technical challenge about scalability that needs to be addressed.

Think about the resources needed for optimal flow and well-being. Think about what would make an ecosystem of organizations thrive. If you are thinking about money then you are being lazy. Its not about the money, but about the resources you want to use money for. What needs to circulate and then recirculate and how can that happen?

Living things are in a 'state of flux' constantly changing. The perfection of the flows of nature allow for an economy where Deep Wealth is possible. Beyond money, honoring all that is beyond measure, beyond transaction, that live in the space of the naming. Natures economy is Sacred economy.

“The world is interdependent. We are interdependent. The current economic system is designed to extract resources from and exploit people and the environment.” Can we redesign our systems of governance, economics, and society to meet the current and projected needs of all species, while restoring the inherent right of all species to thrive in their own habitats?

The room is breathing through a different light. We came from the interior dimensions to the exterior ones. People feel more comfortable about speaking about what is “out there”.

The economies we design will determine our capacity for collective intelligence. It’s DNA folks. The emergence of speculative new forms of currency has created a new “Gold rush”. Yet if you think about them in terms of DNA, can we truly create thriving social organisms with them? As a currency designer, I know abundance and prosperity can be designed through current-sees that follow the principles of living systems. Follow the cues and design for flows that enable anti-fragility, learning, balance of power, listening, radiance, generosity, management of the commons.

The indigenous societies thrived because they understood the power of community and the universal flows of life. They lived in shared economies, the abundance was shared. A ‘commons’. A “Commonwealth”. The “de-colonized mind”, as Thomas Berry says, understand that everything in the universe is interconnected. There is no creation without destruction, no destruction without creation. Life is flow.

It’s interesting that some indigenous cultures managed to separate financial wealth from power. ****Think about that. It’s the paradox of sovereign nations, how money can be redesigned so it’s not a black hole that sucks everything into it. It’s about life and death.

The indigenous cultures have taught us that the deepest truth about civilization is that it was never meant for us. It has always served another species, another environment, another cosmos. We claim to be stewards, yet today we are destroying the biosphere. The indigenous tribes have taught us that if we listen to the waters, to the winds, to the animals, to the plants, to all voices and the entire animate world that inhabit the cosmos we will learn how to live in harmony with the whole.

“If we lived our lives in harmony with one another, and with the natural order, there would be no reason to make war with one another.” - Chief Seattle

The circle created so much choice, so much love, connection, intimacy. The more love unfolded the more love kept flowing among us. All-inclusive Love that continues to choose love. The plenary from the Café was not a “report” of insights alone, it was a fulfillment ritual. Keepers of waters from around the world placed their waters in a container and our Hawaiian Grandmother released it into the river. Including tears shed and a rain of prayers. The miracle of the WE was palpable and soft as the skin of the beloved.

Let’s arrive together into this present time. Heal our pain, embrace the shadows, claim our potential as harmonious societies. Can we release our shame, clear the victim / oppressor with love, compassion and patience, face our fears? Can we create mutual sovereignty and open societies? Can we create information systems that allow us to have the intelligence of the cells? New DNA for our social organisms. Our future is exciting. Our energy doesn't need to be sucked into the past, or running away into the future. We can be increasingly strong, wise and abundant.

Radical partnership begins with the Self, with tuning in, like a fine instrument, to the precious melodies that nourish life. As you commit to be “all in” with all the multifaceted ecology that holds and sustains all of life, you will experience an increasing revelation of your genius and attract co-creators. Togetherness opens up a field of service and play. It creates a unified source field where we dance with our tantric energies, our love energies, where sparks of bliss and joy and the rapture for all creation ignite the possibility of thriving polycultures and virtuous systems. We can experience and embodied ecstatic collaboration with all the animate world!

Ferananda, in radical partnership with life and spirit

 

CONTENT

Article 01

Indigenous peoples across the globe are uniquely equipped to deal with the climate crisis - so why are we being left out of these conversations?
by Janine Mohamed, Pat Anderson and Veronica Matthews, University of Sydney

 

 

Janine Mohamed, Pat Anderson and Veronica Matthews

The urgency of tackling climate change is even greater for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and other First Nation peoples across the globe. First Nations people will be disproportionately affected and are already experiencing existential threats from climate change.

The unfolding disaster in the Northern Rivers regions of New South Wales is no exception, with Aboriginal communities completely inundated or cut off from essential supplies.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have protected Country for millennia and have survived dramatic climatic shifts. We are intimately connected to Country, and our knowledge and cultural practices hold solutions to the climate crisis. Despite this, we continue to be excluded from leadership roles in climate solution discussions, such as the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report.

This continued exclusion is why investigation of the impacts of climate change on First Nations people is needed.

In October last year, the Lowitja Institute, in partnership with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander National Health Leadership Forum and the Climate and Health Alliance, brought together researchers, community members, young people and advocates from across the country at a round-table discussion.

Together, they put together the findings for the Discussion Paper Climate change and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health.

How climate change impacts Indigenous peoples

As the paper tells us, climate change threatens our social and cultural determinants of health, including access to Country, traditional foods, safe water, appropriate housing and health services.

Aboriginal health services are already struggling to operate in extreme weather, with increasing demands and a reduced workforce. All these forces combine to exacerbate already unacceptable levels of ill-health within Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations and compound the historical and contemporary injustices of colonisation.

During the round table, we heard powerful and moving stories from communities on the front line of climate change.

Norman Frank Jupurrurla, a community leader from Tennant Creek, spoke of sacred waterholes drying up, ancient shade trees dying, temperatures rising, inadequate housing, power going out and spoiled essential food and medicines.

Vanessa Napaltjarri Davis, a Warlpiri/Northern Arrente woman and Senior Researcher at Tangentyere Council in Mparntwe/Alice Springs, spoke of changes to the availability of bush foods and medicines – essential to our health and well-being – due to changing temperatures and seasons.

For example, as Norman Frank Jupurrurla wrote:

…now the country is burning, getting destroyed, because of climate change. Already, I cannot see sand goannas any more.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples hold a deep and painful knowledge of the role dominant culture, racism and colonial power dynamics play within climate change. Although there have been many suggested solutions to climate change, access to these solutions is not equally or equitably available across Australia.

Norman Frank Jupurrurla demonstrated this when he shared the almost impossibly drawn-out process he has completed to become the first person to install solar panels on public housing in Tennant Creek, Northern Territory.

Indigenous peoples’ voices excluded from climate change conversations

Colonisation has ignored Indigenous ways of knowing, doing and being, right down to the weather. Colonisers insisted we live according to just four seasons, instead of the many seasons our people knew and respected.

This experience of marginalisation continues today where we have not been sufficiently included in national and international conversations about climate change, including being pushed to the sidelines at COP26.

The IPCC acknowledged this globally in its report last year. The report states that data and most reporting on climate change do not include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander or local knowledge in the assessment findings.

The IPCC’s most recent report looks to recognise this omission and focuses specifically on the importance of our role and knowledge in addressing the climate crisis and the need for climate justice.

The calls from our work are clear. We must elevate Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voices within climate change action and centre Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as leaders in protecting Country. In the words of Seed Mob, “We cannot have climate justice without First Nations justice.”

In seeking solutions, we must consider how colonial ideologies and practices around climate change can impact on our peoples. As Rhys Jones wrote, “It is not possible to understand and address climate-related health impacts for Indigenous peoples without examining this broader context of colonial oppression, marginalisation and dispossession.”

The Uluru Statement from the Heart, a gift to the Australian People, provides the road map for action:

• We must correct power asymmetries and establish co-governance arrangements and become strong advocates of, not only our interests, but our capabilities to tackle climate change.

• We must restore access to basic rights that will lay the groundwork for action that includes appropriate community participation/decision-making and incorporates cultural, environmental and sustainable design.

• We must weave our knowledges and strengthen partnerships to ensure that our collective wisdom and knowledge as Australia’s First Nations is integrated into climate adaptation and mitigation planning, directly benefitting the whole nation.

Indigenous people know about this continent; we’ve looked after it for millennia.

The Uluru Statement from the Heart gives the opportunity to restore that ancient power – for the benefit of us all and the survival of the planet.

 

Janine Mohamed, Distinguished Fellow and CEO; Pat Anderson, Chairperson, and Veronica Matthews, Senior Research Fellow, The University Centre for Rural Health, University of Sydney

 

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license.

 

CONTENT

The Future Now Show

Indigenous Values
with Peachie Dioquino-Valera

Peachie talks about the philosophy of an Indigenous Knowledge that delves on interbeing or interrelatedness. In the Lakota language this concept is called Mitakuye Oyasin, which means “Everything is connected”. Listen on how this indigenous spiritualism is said to be one of the keys to achieving peace and regeneration in both the internal and natural world.

 

Peachie Dioquino-Valera
Climate Reality Leader | Resource Speaker | Writer | Futures Learning Advisor | Consultancy (Community Dev.; Sustainability & Regenerative Design; Comms) | Conservationist | Citizen Scientist | Intuitive Counsel | COS Talent
Philippines

 

 

 

Resources

• An Indigenous peoples’ approach to climate justice
  
  
• The Engagement of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities Crucial to Tackling Climate Crisis
  
  
• Amazon tribes
  
  
• Introducing The Seventh Generation Principle – to Promote True Sustainability
  
  
• 7th Generation Principle – Designing Systems For Continuity Through Time
  
  
• Aho Mitakuye Oyasin

 

Credits


Peachie Dioquino
Climate Reality Leader | Resource Speaker | Writer | Futures Learning Advisor | Consultancy (Community Dev.; Sustainability & Regenerative Design; Comms) | Conservationist | Citizen Scientist | Intuitive Counsel | COS Talent
Philippines
www.climaterealityproject.org

 

Felix B Bopp
Producer of The Future Now Show
clubofamsterdam.com

The Future Now Show
https://clubofamsterdam.com/the-future-now-show

You can find The Future Now Show also at

LinkedIn: The Future Now Show Group
YouTube: The Future Now Show Channel

CONTENT

Article 02

Indigenous Fashion

 

 

 

Indigenous Fashion Designer Reclaims Native Culture On The Runway
by NowThis

Korina Emmerich is a fashion designer and sustainable fashion advocate reclaiming Indigenous culture and empowering her Native sisters on the runway.

 

Fashioning respect for Bolivia's indigenous with traditional clothing
by CGTN America

The election of an indigenous president in 2006 ushered in a new era in Bolivia. Now, indigenous culture is striding onto the world's top catwalks - as designers incorporate the the styles of indigenous Aymara women - known as Cholas or Cholitas -- into high fashion.

 

 

 

 

Lomé, the new African fashion capital
by France 24

When it comes to fashion, a wave of change is washing over the African continent. Young Togolese designer Jacques Logoh has been running Lomé’s International Fashion Festival (FIMO) for six years now. He's aiming to establish a yearly meet-up for African designers. This pan-African approach to the fashion industry is seen as an economic strength and a force for social cohesion.

 

 

 

 

CONTENT

News about the Future

> Aquadrone that removes plastics
> A fabric that “hears” your heart's sounds

Aquadrone that removes plastics

The WasteShark is an aquadrone that removes plastics and other floating debris from the water surface. It was designed especially for use in ports and harbors. Shaped like a catamaran, WasteShark can collect up to 350 kg of trash at a time. The electrically propelled drone produces zero carbon emissions and is compact and agile. RanMarine Technology developed the design and prototype through a start-up accelerator program for port innovators in Rotterdam.

The algorithms supplied by DFKI will enable the drone to find it’s way back from the harbor basin to a docking station, where it can deposit the collected trash and re-charge it’s batteries.

WasteShark aquadrone (Photo: RanMarine Technology)

A fabric that “hears” your heart's sounds

An MIT team has designed an “acoustic fabric,” woven with a fiber that is designed from a “piezoelectric” material that produces an electrical signal when bent or mechanically deformed, providing a means for the fabric to convert sound vibrations into electrical signals.

The fabric can capture sounds ranging in decibel from a quiet library to heavy road traffic, and determine the precise direction of sudden sounds like handclaps. When woven into a shirt’s lining, the fabric can detect a wearer’s subtle heartbeat features. The fibers can also be made to generate sound, such as a recording of spoken words, that another fabric can detect.

“Wearing an acoustic garment, you might talk through it to answer phone calls and communicate with others,” says lead author Wei Yan, who is now an assistant professor at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. “In addition, this fabric can imperceptibly interface with the human skin, enabling wearers to monitor their heart and respiratory condition in a comfortable, continuous, real-time, and long-term manner.”

Image: Greg Hren

 

CONTENT

Article 03

Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change

The IPCC has finalized the third part of the Sixth Assessment Report, Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change, the Working Group III contribution. It was finalized on 4 April.

The Working Group III report provides an updated global assessment of climate change mitigation progress and pledges, and examines the sources of global emissions. It explains developments in emission reduction and mitigation efforts, assessing the impact of national climate pledges in relation to long-term emissions goals.

 

Read the report HERE

 

 

 

 

Climate Change Mitigation Strategies

Join Dr. Peter Carter, Paul Beckwith and Regina Valdez as they discuss some of their favourite Climate Change Mitigation Strategies.

This video was recorded on January 21st, 2022, and published on February 12th, 2022.

Some of the topics discussed:
- One of the top 10 Project Drawdown mitigation strategies of educating women and girls.
- The importance of climate education and how governments should be involved in this process.
- The need for both the public and governments to mobilize on climate actions
- How demilitarization and international peace is a prerequisite for sustainability and our survival
- More education to create systems thinkers with the wisdom to come with solutions to the climate crisis without creating new problems
- How governments need to incentivize corporations so that it is profitable for them to help the environment and the climate rather than destroy them for the sake of profits alone.
- The idea of strategy versus tactics as they pertain to game theory but also towards climate change mitigation.
- The need to stop governments from subsidizing fossil fuels and also the need for big banks to stop financing fossil fuel projects.
- The need to keep one’s perspective and realize that Climate Change is a large and complex problem requiring a diverse array of strategies and tactics to address it.
- and more. . .

Links:
- Project Drawdown
....

Our Website:
https://climateemergencyforum.org

 

 

 

CONTENT

Recommended Book

Me Tomorrow: Indigenous Views on the Future
by Drew Hayden Taylor

 

In 'Me Tomorrow', First Nations, Metis and Inuit artists, activists, educators and writers, youth and elders come together to envision Indigenous futures in Canada and around the world. Discussing everything from language renewal to sci-fi, this collection is a powerful and important expression of imagination rooted in social critique, cultural experience, traditional knowledge, activism and the multifaceted experiences of Indigenous people on Turtle Island.

 

Me Tomorrow: Indigenous Views on the Future with Drew Hayden Taylor, Norma Dunning and Darrel J. MacLeod

Me Tomorrow: Indigenous Views on the Future features First Nations, Métis and Inuit artists, activists, educators and writers, youth and elders come together to envision Indigenous futures in Canada and around the world.

Me Tomorrow covers everything from language renewal to sci-fi. It is a powerful and important expression of imagination rooted in social critique, cultural experience, traditional knowledge, activism and the multifaceted experiences of Indigenous people on Turtle Island.

For readers who want to imagine the future, and to cultivate a better one, Me Tomorrow is a journey through the visions generously offered by a diverse group of Indigenous thinkers.

 

 

 

 

 

Drew Hayden Taylor


During the last thirty years of his career, Drew Hayden Taylor has done many things, most of which he is proud of. An Ojibway from the Curve Lake First Nations in Ontario, he has worn many hats in his literary career, from performing stand-up comedy at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., to being Artistic Director of Canada’s premiere Native theatre company, Native Earth Performing Arts. He has been an award-winning playwright, a journalist/columnist (appearing regularly in several Canadian newspapers and magazines), short-story writer, novelist, television scriptwriter, and has worked on numerous documentaries exploring the Native experience. Most notably as a filmmaker, he wrote and directed REDSKINS, TRICKSTERS AND PUPPY STEW, a documentary on Native humour for the National Film Board of Canada, and for CBC, co-created SEARCHING FOR WINNETOU, an exploration of Germany’s fascination with North American Indigenous culture.

He has traveled to sixteen countries around the world, spreading the gospel of Native literature to the world. Through many of his books, most notably the four volume set of the FUNNY, YOU DON'T LOOK LIKE ONE series, he has tried to educate and inform the world about issues that reflect, celebrate, and interfere in the lives of Canada's First Nations.

Self described as a contemporary story teller in what ever form, last summer saw the production of the third season of MIXED BLESSINGS, a television comedy series he co-created and is the head writer for. This fall, a made-for-tv movie he wrote, based on his Governor General's nominated play was nominated for three Gemini Awards, including Best Movie. Originally it aired on APTN and opened the American Indian Film Festival in San Francisco, and the Dreamspeakers Film Festival in Edmonton.

The last few years has seen him proudly serve as the Writer-In-Residence at the University of Michigan and the University of Western Ontario. In 2007, Annick Press published his first Novel, THE NIGHT WANDERER: A Native Gothic Novel, a teen novel about an Ojibway vampire. Two years ago, his non-fiction book exploring the world of Native sexuality, called ME SEXY, was published by Douglas & McIntyre. It is a follow up to his highly successful book on Native humour, ME FUNNY.

The author of 20 books in total, he is eagerly awaiting the publication of his new novel in February by Random House as "One of the new faces of fiction for 2010", titled MOTORCYCLES AND SWEETGRASS. In January, his new play, DEAD WHITE WRITER ON THE FLOOR, opens at Magnus Theatre in Thunder Bay. Currently, he is working on a new play titled CREES IN THE CARRIBEAN, and a collection of essays called POSTCARDS FROM THE FOUR DIRECTIONS. More importantly, he is desperately trying to find the time to do his laundry.

Oddly enough, the thing his mother is most proud of is his ability to make spaghetti from scratch.

CONTENT

Article 04

Indigenous Food

Indigenous cuisine is a type of cuisine that is based on the preparation of cooking recipes with products obtained from native species of a specific area. Indigenous cuisine is prepared using indigenous ingredients of vegetable or animal origin in traditional recipes of the typical cuisine of a place. - Google

 

Indigenous food systems, biocultural heritage and the SDGs
by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED)

This is the first half of the first day of a four-part virtual workshop co-hosted by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) and Royal Botanic Gardens Kew on 'Indigenous food systems, biocultural heritage and the SDGs: challenges, interdisciplinary research gaps and empowering methodologies'.

The workshop brought together a range of actors, including UK academics from humanities and botanical sciences, agri-food sectors, action-researchers, indigenous experts and FAO. It aimed to enable equitable dialogue between diverse actors and disciplines.

 

 

 

Traditional Native foods are the key ingredient in the Sioux Chef's healthy cooking
by PBS NewsHour

Chef Sean Sherman, founder of the company The Sioux Chef, uses ingredients native to the Americas to draw attention to the long-forgotten Native culinary tradition. His research and cooking are also a way to push back against processed foods that he and others blame for grave health consequences in the U.S. today. Special correspondent Fred de Sam Lazaro reports from St. Paul, Minnesota.

 

 

 

The Inuit and their Indigenous Foods
by Indigenous Peoples’ nutrition

On Baffin Island, within the Nunavut Territory, the rural community of Pangnirtung uses traditional knowledge and country food to address emerging health patterns resulting from transition in nutrition and all facets of life. Working with the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, the Government of Nunavut Department of Health and Social Services and the Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated, the project promotes health and well-being of community members with focus on local Inuit food.

 

 

 

The Maasai and their Indigenous Foods
by Indigenous Peoples’ nutrition

In recent decades Indigenous Peoples globally have experienced rapid and dramatic shifts in lifestyle that are unprecedented in history. Moving away from their own self-sustaining, local food systems into industrially derived food supplies, these changes have adverse effects on dietary.

The pastoral community of Enkereyian is on the floor of the Great Rift Valley in Kenya within the Ngong Division of Kajaido District. The Mainyoito Pastoralist Integrated Development Organization (MPIDO) and the Rural Outreach Program (ROP) studied traditional Maasai food use within the context of culture, food security, nutrition and environmental sustainability.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why We Need to Grow More Indigenous Foods
by NowThis Earth

The industrialization of food harshly impacts developing countries — but growing more indigenous foods might offer a solution.

This video was created in partnership with Eat Forum, the Stockholm Resilience Centre, and the IKEA Foundation.

Our global farming system has failed to feed the world’s population but growing more diverse foods might be a way to fix this. Despite producing enough food in a year to feed the plant, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization found that an estimated 2.4 billion people faced moderate to severe food insecurities in 2020. Laura Pereira is a researcher at Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stellenbosch University, and Utrecht University. Her research focuses on the industrialization of the food system and how it affects developing countries.

Between 1960 and 2000, yields for those primary crops rose dramatically in developing countries: 208% for wheat, 109% for rice, 157% for maize, 78% for potatoes, and 36% for cassava. Although the green revolution’s goal was to create more food for the planet, subsidies incentivized the production of single crops and we ended up with too much of those foods. Alternative uses for these crops had to be explored. In the US, for example, corn has been so heavily subsidized that farmers grew too much for the population to eat so now it’s used in things like bio fuel, animal feed, fructose syrup, and adhesives.

Another effect of this boost in production, Pereira says, is a reduction in the production of less profitable crops that could provide a more balanced diet. While communities are increasingly focused on growing cash crops for their economic benefits they are also moving further away from growing food to meet their own nutritional needs. Pereira says that one solution to this problem is to grow more food that is indigenous to the land, rather than applying technology to grow foreign crops. This would decrease monoculture, help reduce the need to buy cheap unhealthy food, and provide a larger variety of foods to get nutrients from.

 

 

 

 

 

CONTENT

Climate Change Success Story

Regenerative Resources

 

Regenesrative Resources is an Ecosystems Services company.

• We acquire highly-degraded land, either by purchase, long-term lease, or in partnership with landholders (governments, tribes, private owners)
  
  
• We transform that land, whether into restored ecosystems or agroecologies.
  
  
• We commercialize the outputs of that transformation.

 

RSA:
What is Regenerative Seawater Agriculture?

• It is the first regenerative on-shore aquaculture system, integrating high-tech seafood production with seawater agroecology, mangrove agroforestries, and groves of seagrasses.
  
  
• It is the key economic system we deploy at RRC: a proprietary zero-waste, circular, and regenerative seafood system that restores coastal ecologies and ignites local blue economies.

 

Current Projects - Regenerative Resources

There are 15,000,000 hectares globally where our RSA system can be deployed to create regenerative blue economies and to enable coastal ecosystem restoration. Our current projects involve growing 100,000,000 mangroves, restoring thousands of hectares of seagrass meadows, creating thousands of jobs in regenerative economic development, and establishing our first regional hubs in Latin America, West Africa, South Africa, and the EU.

 

MEXICO

Fishery depletion, fresh-water scarcity, and deforestation are affecting rural coastal communities in much of Mexico, which has lost at least 25% of its mangroves since the 1980’s.

Starting in Baja California Sur, and in collaboration with SEMARNAT, local fishing villages, and multiple other NGOs, we are embarking on a massive endeavor to create regenerative blue economies and restore vast areas of degraded mangrove & seagrass habitat, with a goal of growing 1 billion mangroves in Mexico alone.

Project: MELITÓN
Our flagship project in Baja California Sur is an 8,000 hectare RSA.
Key details:

• Permits & right to purchase already in hand
• Mangrove trees to be grown: 45,000,000
• Timeline to completion: 8 years after predevelopment phase
• Estimated Net Carbon Sequestered: 9,000,000 tons
• Finance: Blue Carbon, Real Estate, Regenerative Agricultures
  

Project: EL DELGADITO
In partnership with the organization Mujeres del Delgadito, we are launching a mangrove & seagrass restoration project.
Key details:

• Permits in hand for phase 1 of mangrove restoration (Rhizophora & Laguncularia)
• Good relationships with local communities & local leadership established.
• Verification of social & environmental impact to be performed by CIBNOR & UABCS
• Estimated mangroves grown: 12,000,000
• Estimated Hectares of seagrass restored: 2,000
• Estimated carbon sequestered: 5,000,000 tons
• Project Timeline: 6 years to completion
• Funding: DAF + Blue Carbon

SPAIN


Desertification affects an estimated 1/3 of Spain’s agricultural lands. In Andalucía this is due primarily to unsustainable water use, and salinization. This photo, taken July 2021, illustrates a 50% fall in rice production in the region, despite proximity to a river. Why? The river is salty, and the wells have run dry.

This was once a marsh, on the banks of the Guadalquivir River. Earthworks have dried it up, ostensibly for agricultural production, but the soil is too salty for any traditional crops. Using seawater we can make these lands productive again!

These tidal marshes were once a staple of the Phoenician and Roman civilizations, producing salt for centuries. But they have fallen into disrepair and attempts to make them productive led to the destruction of seagrass groves in the bay of Cádiz.

Project Marisma: Wetland Agroecologies
Key details:

• Thousands of hectares of applicable landscape in Andalucía
• Estimated 200 tons of blue carbon sequestered per hectare per year–millions of tons at scale.
• Will restore these degraded lands to productivity
• Will increase biodiversity, particularly local aquatic & migratory bird species.
  
  

Project: CEREAL MARINO

Seagrasses are a critical coastal ecosystem, but also show immense promise as the world’s first ocean cereal crop. In collaboration with multiple entities in Spain, we intend to prototype seagrasses as a crop in marsh-based agroecologies in Andalucía. While this could be IP’d and used to create a billion dollar business (imagine being the first to patent rice or wheat), we intend to open source all our findings and developments from this project, and thus are seeking philanthropic funds for its execution.


GHANA

Deforestation, fishery depletion, coastal erosion, and soil salinization are driving forced displacement and poverty in the Keta and Songor regions.

The degradation-poverty cycle will continue unabated without the creation of regenerative economies that directly address both.

In partnership with villages in the Keta and Songor region, we are launching a combined mangrove restoration & regenerative economic development program, targeting 7,000 hectares of highly degraded and saline land.

Project: Volta Delta Restoration & Regenerative Economic Development

In partnership with multiple tribes and villages, we are targeting 6000 hectares of highly degraded land for mangrove restoration
Key details:

• First 2,700 hectares already leased.
• Good relationships with local communities & local leadership established.
• Permits acquired and collaboration begun with local forestry & lands commissions
• 50,000 mangroves grown in 2020
• 25,000,000 mangroves to be grown through 2027
• Multiple community nurseries already established.
• Estimated carbon sequestered: 6,000,000 tons
• Project Timeline: 6 years to completion
• Economic Systems: Apiculture, RSA, Community Coppice
• Proposed Funding: Blue Carbon + DAF

NAMIBIA

1000 miles of coastline bordering the oldest desert on earth provides a serious opportunity for Regenerative Seawater Agriculture. With seawater as an infinite resource, RSA has the potential to convert these desolate landscapes to highly productive systems that benefit biodiversity, sequester carbon, and create the foundation for new rural economies.

In November 2021, RRC signed an MOU with the Namibia Infrastructure Development & Investment Fund (NIDIF), to develop the first coastal RSA systems along the skeleton coast, as well as a brackish wetland agroecology in the interior.
The potential for both these systems to solve local economic and global climate issues is significant.

Project: Namib Saltwater Farms

Much of the interior of Namibia used to be a massive sea. Highly brackish groundwater and a complete dearth of rainfall means much of these lands can only be productive through seawater farming systems. Thus we are collaborating with farmers to establish brackish water agroecologies and constructed wetlands.
Key details:

• First farm collaboration established.
• Multiple species trials underway

Project: Namibian Coast Mangrove Agroforestry

Key details:

• First 40 hectare site selected
• Local Team under development
• Funding: NIDIF + PE + Blue Carbon

CONTENT

Futurist Portrait

Jason Edward Lewis
Hawaiian and Samoan digital media theorist, poet, and software designer

 

 

Jason founded Obx Laboratory for Experimental Media and is the University Research Chair in Computational Media and the Indigenous Future Imaginary as well as a Professor of Computation Arts at Concordia University, Montreal.

Jason directs the Initiative for Indigenous Futures, and co-directs the Indigenous Futures Research Centre, the Indigenous Protocol and AI Workshops, the Aboriginal Territories in Cyberspace research network, and the Skins Workshops on Aboriginal Storytelling and Video Game Design.


Lewis’ creative and production work has been featured at Ars Electronica, Mobilefest, Elektra, Urban Screens, ISEA, SIGGRAPH, and FILE, among other venues, and has been recognized with the inaugural Robert Coover Award for Best Work of Electronic Literature, two Prix Ars Electronica Honorable Mentions, several imagineNATIVE Best New Media awards and multiple solo exhibitions. His research interests include emergent media theory and history, and methodologies for conducting art-led technology research. In addition to being lead author on the award-winning “Making Kin with the Machines” essay and editor of the groundbreaking Indigenous Protocol and Artificial Intelligence Position Paper, he has contributed to chapters in collected editions covering Indigenous futures, mobile media, video game design, machinima and experimental pedagogy with Indigenous communities.

Lewis has worked in a range of industrial research settings, including Interval Research, US West's Advanced Technology Group, and the Institute for Research on Learning, and, at the turn of the century, he founded and ran a research studio for the venture capital firm Arts Alliance.

Lewis is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, an ISO-MIT Co-Creation Lab Fellow, a former Trudeau Fellow and a former Carnegie Fellow. He received a B.S. in Symbolic Systems (Cognitive Science) and B.A. in German Studies (Philosophy) from Stanford University, and an M.Phil. in Design from the Royal College of Art.

 

 

Indigenous AI 101 with Jason Edward Lewis

What is Indigenous AI and how might it drive our technology design and implementation?

To answer this question and more in this episode we interview Jason Edward Lewis about Indigenous AI Protocols and a paper he co-authored entitled “Position Paper on Indigenous Protocol and Artificial Intelligence.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

CONTENT

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