18. Life Below Water

SDG 14: Life Below Water focuses on conserving and sustainably using the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development.

Hiliary Monteith is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Nutritional Sciences at the University of Toronto and a Registered Dietitian. Hilary's research focus is on diabetes prevention and maternal and infant health using community-based participatory research in partnership with an Indigenous community in Northwestern Ontario. Alongside community members and leaders, she considers the role of health and social factors in infant and early childhood growth trajectories and intergenerational pathways to support chronic disease prevention. Her research interests also include cultural safety within health professional training, food and water security and sovereignty for Indigenous communities, equitable healthcare access and services, Indigenous student mentorship and the intersections between these areas. She is a co-editor for the Turtle Island Journal of Indigenous Health, which aims to co-create safe spaces within the academic environment and beyond for Indigenous voices and ways of knowing and being.

Dr. Tracey Galloway is a biological anthropologist and community health scholar at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Her research aims to reduce the burden of chronic disease among Indigenous people living in northern communities by removing existing barriers to health and food security. Tracey works alongside Indigenous leaders, Elders and other allies on projects that improve access to health services and affordable food in northern communities. Tracey’s partnerships extend across the circumpolar north and she is recognized globally as an expert on the health of circumpolar Indigenous populations. She is an active member of the International Union for Circumpolar Health and has worked extensively with scholars from the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium, the Greenland Institute for Public Health, and the Danish National Institute for Public Health. Her work is valued for its commitment to decolonizing principles and its support for Indigenous governance.

CREDITS: This podcast is co-hosted by Dr. Erica Di Ruggiero, Director of the Centre for Global Health, and Ophelia Michaelides, Manager of the Centre for Global Health, at the DLSPH, U of T, and produced by Elizabeth Loftus. Audio editing is by Sylvia Lorico. Music is produced by Julien Fortier and Patrick May. It is made with the support of the School of Cities at U of T. 

Transcript

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:00:07] I'm Erica Di Ruggiero, and this is Healthy Cities in the SDG Era, a podcast about the Sustainable Development Goals and how research conducted by faculty and students at the University of Toronto is helping to achieve them. We're recording from Toronto or Tkaronto, which for thousands of years has been the traditional land of the Huron-Wendat, the Seneca and the Mississaugas of the Credit. Today, this meeting place is still the home to many indigenous people from across Turtle Island and we are grateful to have the opportunity to work on this land. In this episode, we'll look into SDG 14 Life Below Water. SDG 14 promotes the conservation and sustainable use of oceans, seas and marine resources. They cover 70% of the planet, and we rely on them for food and water security. However, climate change continues to have a significant impact on marine life due to ocean waste disposal, overfishing and rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere which contribute to ocean acidification and marine pollution. Consequently, this war jeopardizes the health of our planet and also the people who live on our planet. As researchers, our understanding of the species requires an interdisciplinary framework. So in this episode, we'll speak with Hillary Monteith and Tracey Galloway regarding the impact of marine conservation on food, water and nutrients security. With a particular focus on indigenous peoples. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:01:48] Hiliary Monteith is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Nutritional Sciences at the University of Toronto and a registered dietitian. Hillary's research focuses on diabetes prevention and maternal and infant health, using community-based participatory research in partnership with an indigenous community in northwestern Ontario. Alongside community members and leaders, she considers the role of health and social factors in infant and early childhood growth trajectories and intergenerational pathways to support chronic disease prevention. Hillary's research interests also include cultural safety within health, professional training, food and water security and sovereignty for indigenous communities, equitable health care, access and services, indigenous student mentorship and the intersections between these areas. She is a coeditor for the Turtle Island Journal of Indigenous Health, which aims to co-create safe spaces within the academic environment and beyond for indigenous voices and ways of knowing and being. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:02:52] Dr. Tracy Galloway is a biological anthropologist and community scholar at the University of Toronto, Mississauga. Her research aims to reduce the burden of chronic disease among indigenous people living in northern communities by removing existing barriers to health and food security. Tracy works alongside indigenous leaders, elders and other allies on projects that improve access to health services and affordable food in northern communities. Tracy's partnerships extend across the circumpolar north and she is recognized globally as an expert on the health of circumpolar indigenous populations. She is an active member of the International Union for Circumpolar Health and has worked extensively with scholars from the Alaska Native Tribe Tribal Health Consortium, the Greenland Institute for Public Health and the Danish National Institute for Public Health. Her work is valued for its commitment to decolonizing principles and its support for indigenous governance. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:03:53] Hello, Hiliary and Tracy. Delighted to have you on the program. Let's just start by each of you telling us a little bit about your research. 

Hiliary Monteith [00:04:04] Hi Erica, thanks so much for having us today. So, as you know, I'm currently finishing my Ph.D. at the University of Toronto and in nutritional sciences. And also as part of the collaborative specialization in Indigenous Health at the Waakebiness-Bryce Institute for Indigenous Health. My current research is in partnership with an initiative at Community in northwestern Ontario. And it focuses on early life factors related to type two diabetes. But as part of this work, we also focus on social and environmental factors like food and water insecurity, income, mental health and health care access, particularly as it relates to cultural safety. And I'm quite interested in community-based work as it relates to Indigenous health research. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:04:51] Now that's great for unpacking that a little bit in the next few questions, but let me turn to Tracy to hear a little bit about your research. 

Tracey Galloway [00:05:00] Thank you, Erica. Good morning. I run a fairly large research program with sites across northern Canada. And my interest is broadly in northern indigenous community health and wellbeing. And that's because northern peoples still face really persistent and entrenched inequities in the basic building blocks of society, things like access to food, access to affordable and really dignified housing, access to energy, to power their homes and their schools and their businesses, and access to public and primary health services. And so access to clean water and sanitation is a really key piece of local infrastructure that many communities lack. And I work in partnership with indigenous community researchers on solutions to these challenges. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:05:47] Thanks for those really important interventions. Hiliary, I'm going to start with a question for you. So can you tell us a little bit about how pollution impacts our water and food systems and in what ways do our water systems impact food adequacy and safety? 

Hiliary Monteith [00:06:06] I think the short answer is in every way it's important to understand that all things are connected and that our food comes from the land and water. I think sometimes that's easy to forget because we're so used to relying on market food systems. But having access to safe and reliable water is essential to health and wellbeing and can also impact the quality of foods so particularly fish. We know that pollution can reduce fish species and cause disease and therefore impact the nutritional content and safety of these foods for human consumption and as well impact traditional foods like large land based animals in indigenous communities, or at least some indigenous communities in Canada. It's actually not safe to consume the fish because of water pollution and climate change. And this can be really concerning both from a physical health standpoint, but also from a food sovereignty perspective, too. And more broadly, I think we see this reflected in nutrition guidelines for fish consumption. So, for example, pregnant women are recommended not to consume certain types of fish because of pollutants or they're recommended to consume a smaller quantity. So, for example, tuna, which contains mercury, can be concerning in higher quantities. But as I said, this isn't only an issue around food adequacy and safety, but also food sovereignty, where we see that communities, indigenous communities aren't able to participate in traditional life ways like fishing and trapping because of the pollution and climate change. And so I think it's important to mention in relation to that that communities respond with adaptations and renewed strength. So just an example of this. More recently it came to my attention and the Atlantic First Nations Water Authority and Atlantic Canada. And there were recently we just took over management of all water and wastewater within local First Nations communities. I think this is a really important step towards self-determination for these communities in that region. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:08:22] Tracey, I know you've given this a lot of thought. Several Indigenous communities continue to lack access to clean water as a direct result of colonialism. How have historical and current circumstances impacted the issues of food and water insecurity in northern communities with which you've worked? 

Tracey Galloway [00:08:42] Well, just so we start with your listeners having an awareness of just how pervasive this problem is. I checked the water quality status website Water Today.ca. Anybody can take a look there. And today there are nearly 900 active boil water advisories across Canada and most of them are in remote northern and Vancouver coastal communities which have very poor water infrastructure and whose populations are majority indigenous. So they're first nation, Metis or Inuit. When I say majority, I mean that 80 to 90% at least of the population are indigenous. And and so, you know, what we see in the literature is that this lack of clean drinking water is the direct result of historical and ongoing settler colonial violence. So these communities don't happen to lack basic infrastructure. They lack it because they were built historically as a means of enacting bureaucratic control over indigenous people. They were built to limit where indigenous people could live, how they moved, how they worked, where they raised their children, and where those children went to school. And this bureaucracy is hardwired into the Canadian system of governance through the Indian Act, and it continues to affect those communities and people's lives today. And a really good example of that in today's news is this ongoing story of the water system in the city of Iqaluit, in the territory of Nunavut, Canada's largest Northern Territory. So the city has just approved spending over $800,000 to clean some underground water tanks. You know, they have persistent problems lasting more than a year with water quality and with fuel leakage and the smell of fuel in tap water in the city. But Iqaluit is a city built by the Canadian government. It was built just after 1900 as a military base. It was expanded because of the distant, early warning or do line. And then in the 1950s, Inuit from all across northern Canada were relocated there and forced to live there in a place that had not been a large city, but had been a camp used seasonally at the mouth of the river. And so we can really see this bureaucratic history as a form of colonial control that has a legacy today in terms of people's quality of life. And I'd like to cite another example, if I could. Our systems around resource and land use are another example of that hardwired bureaucracy. So the Canadian government has allowed mining and environmental use in northern jurisdictions that has had lasting and devastating effects on water quality. And the prime example of this is the giant gold mine near Yellowknife, where experts estimate that mine produced over 237,000 tonnes of arsenic trioxide dust, which is a known carcinogen during the period where they mined and processed called between 1948 and 1999. And the lead in arsenic contamination from that mine is being observed from samples as far away from the site as lying kilometers in lakes streams and in Yellowknife Bay. And that area is the traditional homeland of the Yellowknife story. So it's another example that really shows how historical federal policy has privileged resource development by for profit southern companies and international mining companies over indigenous control and stewardship of lands. And it's had devastating consequences for water access and people's health. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:12:29] So both of you have actually touched on this. Nutrition insecurity, of course, is influenced by a multitude of social issues. So how does water and food insecurity impact indigenous health and wellbeing? We'd love to hear some examples from your own research. Let's start with you, Hilary. How have you seen this play out in the communities that you've worked in? 

Hiliary Monteith [00:12:53] Yeah. Thanks for this question, Erica. I think it's a really important one. As I alluded to before, food and water are closely connected. And for many indigenous communities living on Turtle Island or what we call North America, food and water are connected to all aspects of life. And so therefore they play an important role in health and well-being. And when we say this, we're not only talking about physical health, we're talking about spiritual, emotional, mental health, health and well-being. And so connection to land and water is part of indigenous way of life and being. And when we have disruptions to this connection, indigenous health and wellbeing can suffer. And within the community that I currently work with, being on the water and in the bush is part of the life way and identity and thankfully is something that continues to be done and is really valuable and important with on the land activities. However, the community's been living with a long term boil advisories since 2003, which means the water is not safe to drink or use for cooking. And so you either have to boil the water or purchase bottled water, and often families are buying bottled water. But the community I work in is within a remote area of northwestern Ontario, and so it's supply and only community, which means that a lot of the goods are flown in. And so they're very expensive. And and I think in particular, buying bottled water really impacts young families because they're focused so closely on ensuring that the water is safe and healthy for their infants and children. And so sometimes it can mean consuming other types of beverages, like sugar sweetened beverages, because these are less expensive and are safer than the tap water. But we know the plethora of research that shows some of the health concerns associated with sugar sweetened beverages, just as one example and you know, within a context where there's a lot of health disparities for indigenous communities, this just continues to to perpetuate those health inequalities that exist. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:15:20] And Tracey, I know we can't know as settler scholars what it's like to live with water insecurity, but can you speak to what it's like when you travel to communities and what it must be like to live with? 

Tracey Galloway [00:15:34] Yeah, I can as settlers, you know, we we really have no personal experience to compare it to. You know, the most insecure many of us are is when we have to take our own water, camping or something like that. But but for people who live in the north, I don't think that's a, you know, an apt comparison. And what I can tell you is when I travel to the north, my research trips are one or two weeks long and I find living under a boil water advisory a constant burden. I'm always wondering whether it's safe to wash the dishes or shower or brush my teeth, how much water I should get on my face, my eyes. I'm constantly monitoring the amount of clean water I have with me and thinking about how to replace it when it's gone. And I see people walking around these communities lining up to fill water from the filter stations carrying these big containers around town. People who have a vehicle will do refill rounds for their neighbors and for elders. And, you know, most of us, I think, can imagine putting up with that amount of inconvenience and anxiety for a few days, but not for much longer than that rain. And so I always ask people, can you imagine putting up with that for 25 years? Like the residents of Neskantaga First Nation in northern Ontario, 24 years, like the residents of Salt Lake Cree Nation. You know, it's really shameful that they have to live with that situation and concern. And I would say that food insecurity is similarly severe and an even more communities than in those that face water shortages. So people live with hunger on a daily basis and they speak about it with pain and with shame for not being able to supply themselves and feed their families. And I think that that lived experience of ongoing anxiety and concern around food security has devastating consequences for people's physical and mental health and is closely connected with things like the high suicide rate in northern communities. I can tell you that when I spoke with colleagues living in the city of Iqaluit after the fire at the Northern Store several years ago, there was a palpable and real anxiety for those people about, you know, where their next meals would come from in the coming days and weeks. So yeah, the effects are severe and long lasting. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:18:06] Yeah, I think it's the, the stress and how that, how the social gets under the skin and how that is perpetuated intergenerationally. You know, it is it's the kind of, I think, point you're making around the lasting effects that that this can have. So part of what we like to hear from our guests on this podcast is how individuals learning and working at the University of Toronto can get involved in acting on a number of different social, health and economic issues. Given the focus on water insecurity and its impact. Hillary, I'd love to hear from a student perspective what your thoughts are on that question. 

Hiliary Monteith [00:18:49] Yeah and Erica, I think this is a really important question. So thank you for asking it. And I think the first thing that comes to mind for me is the importance of having indigenous voices at the forefront of these conversations. And, you know, as Tracy was sharing earlier, it's it's an issue that's significantly impacting indigenous communities in Canada. And so, you know, and I guess the other piece of this is, is that indigenous peoples have been stewards of this land for time immemorial and hold important knowledge. And. And I think we really need to be at the forefront of these conversations because they're disproportionately impacted by the water insecurity. I think the other piece of this too is within the academic setting. I think that supporting spaces to share these knowledges and resources in a respectful and good way is needed. So, for example, the Turtle Island Journal of Indigenous Health, which I've had the privilege of being a part of over the last few years, is an example of space seeking to do this in a good way. And so just a bit about the Journal. It's a student run graduate journal seeking to co-create safe spaces for Indigenous voices related to Indigenous health. And this includes the importance of water. And so I think, you know, creating again, these safe spaces for Indigenous voices and ensuring that they're not...You know, I've put I guess that we're not framing this from a Western perspective always, but privileging an indigenous worldview. And then I think the other piece that comes to mind too, is regarding water related research and working across disciplines. Because as we've talked about, this impacts every aspect of life and relates not only to this specific SDG, but all of the others as well. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:20:59] Yeah. And I was wondering if you could maybe elaborate a little bit, because I know you're finishing your Ph.D. in the Department of Nutritional Sciences. So, you know, but of course, the kind of work that you've done really engages with many disciplines and how they sort of frame these different issues. Any touchstones that you want to reflect on based on your own experience? 

Hiliary Monteith [00:21:26] Yeah, I think particularly with in health and nutrition research and kind of more broadly within the health care system in general, we're used to working in silos and focusing on issues from a particular lens. However, I think now, perhaps more than ever, we need to collaborate across sectors to ensure that solutions support all aspects of health and wellbeing and don't perpetuate harms, particularly for so-called marginalized groups. And to me, this means that we need to have culturally safe practices and think these need to be taught and employed within health care professions and within the academic setting. And on the surface, we may not recognize the connections between kind of basic science, water research, for example, and cultural safety. But given the ongoing systemic racism that impacts access to water for particular groups, solutions need to engage communities in a good way. And I think about this for myself as someone who is non-Indigenous with a mixed white settler ancestry and as a researcher as a dietician, you know, given my position and I think this is something that I need to challenge myself with and be reflexive about, and I encourage others to do the same. I think additionality matters and it's something that I'm always reflecting on and it's yeah, it's important that we do this to ensure that we can step forward in this in this work in a really good way. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:23:03] You know, I think that's a really important message, and I think it's an important message for all scientists, as you're saying, not just qualitative researchers, but actually quantitative researchers and those who do mixed method studies position already and reflexivity is absolutely key. So, Tracy, you know, you're what we call a mid-career scholar, associate professor. So as as someone who's sort of at that stage in her career, what are some of the ways that you think about when it comes to advocating for change? 

Tracey Galloway [00:23:36] And I'm happy to do that. I thought a lot about this. And, you know, I think the primary thing we can do is support emerging scholars like Hillary and her peers because they are seeing new ways of doing things. So we need to support that work and support change within the academy. Also draw on the words of one of my mentors. I'm an anthropologist and thinking about the words of Dr. Nancy Sheppard Hughes, who says that we should engage in dialog those with whom we most disagree as a means of learning how systems are viewed from various perspectives, how problems are viewed from various perspective. And that's a tough thing to do. But I think we really need to lean into that and lean into the advocacy role that supported by our privilege as scholars and public intellectuals who are working at these big institutions. So we can write opinion pieces and commentaries on subjects like food and water and security at subjects that are within our area of expertize and that really affect the lives of people living in these communities. We can respond to requests for extra expertize from these communities and advocacy groups, and one way to frame that kind of applied research is to just see that you're building an empirical base for their advocacy efforts. So collect evidence, conduct really rigorous evaluation, engage with service providers and other technical supports, learn what stands in the way of equitable service delivery, and be a part of the momentum toward changing that. I think within the institution, beyond supporting the wonderful example of emerging scholars, scholars like Hillary, is we can help create those spaces on campus that connect our scholarship with the lived experiences of community members. So invite elders and use and other knowledge keepers to speak at any opportunity like our department colloquiums, instead of just having academics come in, know, broaden that experience so that scholars and emergent scholars on campus hear what it's like to deal with these conditions and experience these colonial legacies. Bring land based activities to campuses. And as scholars get off the campus and engage in land based and water based activities with indigenous people wherever they live, particularly in the north, where these problems are really severe. And the other thing we can do is really build indigenous science into our curriculum and research. So emerging Indigenous scholars are showing us that there are know tremendous sets of knowledge and ways of knowing within Indigenous communities that we haven't in the past engage deeply with. And it's really vital that we do this as a way of breaking down barriers and sort of redressing some of those inequities that we're culpable of as scholarly institutions. Another way that I think that established scholars can really make a difference is working within the funding world. So traditionally, research funding is held by investigators who are professors based at universities. And I've been part of some really novel recent funding opportunities that totally upend that process and place indigenous leaders and knowledge holders at the front end. And so a good example at the University of Toronto is the Connaught Indigenous Community Partnerships Program. But I've been involved in something similar at the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, where indigenous communities decided what priorities they wanted research to be framed around. And then they made a call for experts in those fields and selected themselves from among those experts, which ones they wanted to work with and develop partnerships. And that is really transforms the funding space and gives a lot more power and authority over the processes of research to Indigenous partners. And I think that's really novel and that is the way forward, I think. So yeah, for folks like me who have, you know, established careers and a good base of funding and a chance to decide how we proceed in our research lives, I would say, you know, try some of these new approaches that really challenge the status quo. Things will get better unless we make them better. And we really need to use the privilege and power of our positions to do that. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:28:16] And I think those are excellent suggestions and would help us make some progress, much needed progress towards the Truth and Reconciliation Commission recommendations. And I love your examples about helping Indigenous communities frame the priorities in the first place, because from the get go, other people are usually framing the priorities. Thank you so much, Tracey and Hillary for joining us today. I think you've given us a lot of food for thought and I really have appreciated this opportunity to reflect about these very important issues with both of you. Thanks again. 

Hiliary Monteith [00:28:54] Thanks. 

Tracey Galloway [00:28:55] Thank you. 

Erica Di Ruggiero [00:29:04] To address the struggle for clean water and marine resources, we must be mindful of Canada's ongoing colonial legacy. Settler colonialism resulted in indigenous marine dispossession and the industrial exploitation of these resources. Consequently, this has fueled the existing climate and water crises. We cannot reach the targets of SDG 14 life below water without recognizing the ways in which settler colonialism has impacted the marine rights, governance and access by indigenous peoples. And these are key points that our guests have made. Indigenous communities have maintained the ecological stewardship of marine life since time immemorial. Their diverse knowledge systems reflect a holistic approach to marine conservation, which recognizes the interconnections between humans, animals and nature. Indigenous led solutions are critical, therefore, to the stewardship of oceans, seas and marine resources. Canada's national approach to SDG 14 must therefore center indigenous leaders within marine conservation policies and practices. We'd love to hear your thoughts on healthy cities in the era. If you enjoyed this episode, please rate, subscribe and share to help others find the series. You can find healthy cities in the sky here on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and the Dalla Lana School of Public Health's YouTube page, as well as our Center for Global Health website. Join us for our next episode where we'll look at SDG 7 affordable and clean energy. Thank you for tuning in and we look forward to speaking soon. Take care.