09/30/2026
This year marks the 11th anniversary of the Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action, and unfortunately, we are not making any progress. As Canadians, we are all responsible for reconciliation, and implementing the TRC Calls to Action is a significant opportunity for healing.
What are you doing to ensure the Calls to Action are implemented and not forgotten? Centring Indigenous leadership is key to effective Reconciliation, so that we don’t pursue non-TRC concepts like “economic reconciliation.” If you are a non-Indigenous Canadian, today is a great day to learn about Truth and Reconciliation, and plan the steps you will take year-round to contribute to Reconciliation. If you’re Indigenous, we hope you’re able to create or access healing within your community.
In 2023, the Yellowhead Institute stopped tracking progress on the TRC, because there wasn’t anything to track. The image quote and text below are from: https://yellowheadinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/YI-TRC-C2A-2023-Special-Report-compressed.pdf
“What does economic reconciliation mean, though? While difficult to find a consensus definition, it is clear it does not mean Land Back. Nor does it mean implementing the kinds of meaningful reparations called for in the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) or, for that matter, in Yellowhead Institute’s Cash Back Red Paper. Instead, in the words of a 2023 editorial in the Calgary Herald: “Economic reconciliation is natural resource development.”
It’s no wonder, then, that the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP) argued that, when it comes to Indigenous peoples, “the industry’s strongest role is through ‘economic reconciliation.’” Not compensating First Nations for the environmental, social, and economic damage caused historically by oil and gas development on Indigenous lands but, rather, “identifying feasible ways to share economic opportunities arising from resource development …”
