By Kanisha Acharya-Patel, Staff Lawyer
Last week, Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) introduced a series of upcoming free webinars to increase public understanding of environmental justice and environmental racism.
These webinars are the first public information sessions to follow the passage of the National Strategy Respecting Environmental Racism and Environmental Justice Act (the Act), which became law in June 2024. Under this Act, the federal government is required to “develop a national strategy to promote efforts across Canada to advance environmental justice and to assess, prevent and address environmental racism” (National Strategy). Among other things, the National Strategy must include an examination of the link between race, socioeconomic status, environmental risk, and geographic location.
This Act essentially recognizes that certain populations are disproportionately exposed to and impacted by environmental hazards due to their race, culture, socioeconomic status, geographic location, and other factors. The Act accordingly calls on the federal government to study environmental racism and identify steps that can be taken to advance environmental justice, such as amending laws/policies/programs and increasing the meaningful involvement of communities in environmental policy-making.
What is environmental racism?
Environmentally hazardous sites (including landfills, mines and polluting industries) are disproportionately located in areas inhabited by Indigenous and racialized communities, who will bear the brunt of the environmental, social and health impacts. This is environmental racism, and is perpetuated by the fact that these communities lack political and economic power and have historically been excluded from environmental decision-making. Environmental racism is closely tied to environmental health inequity, which acknowledges that these communities, due to their proximity to environmentally hazardous sites, will be disproportionately exposed to and impacted by toxic substances and pollutants. As expressed by environmental racism expert Dr. Ingrid Waldron, “in Canada, your postal code determines your health”.
Mineral development in Treaty 9 territory is an example of environmental racism. Indigenous communities in Treaty 9 are disproportionately impacted by mineral development on their territory because of their physical proximity to mining sites (increasing their exposure to harmful pollutants through air, food and water) and their culture (mineral development impacts the ability to exercise Treaty rights, including the right to hunt, fish and trap, and inherent rights, including the right to determine the use and development of Indigenous lands and resources). As explained by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the human right to safe drinking water and sanitation, mining in Canada can cause toxic contamination of water sources that supply the First Nation communities, causing serious health impacts to communities who often already face water insecurity. Due to systemic racism and colonization, these communities continue to be excluded from decision-making processes, resulting in mining permits being issued without the consent or meaningful consultation of Indigenous communities.
Environmental racism has also been viewed as environmental discrimination more broadly, because of the many intersecting factors (other than race, location and socioeconomic status) that can also make someone disproportionately impacted by environmental hazards, such as sex, gender and disability. For example, a toxic substance may have sex-specific effects, making people with ovaries more susceptible to harm.
What is environmental justice?
Environmental justice is the response to environmental racism. For the federal government to advance environmental justice, protecting human and environmental health and meaningfully involving impacted communities must be at the forefront of any decision-making process.
Three key principles of environmental justice include:
- Distributional justice: addresses the inequitable distribution of environmental burdens and benefits (ex. access to clean drinking water, exposure to toxic substances, etc.), taking into account the factors which make certain individuals or populations disproportionately impacted (such as race, gender, socioeconomic status, etc.)
- Procedural justice: addresses the inclusivity of decision-making procedures and practices (ex. are the communities most impacted being involved in and benefiting from decision-making processes?)
- Recognitional justice: addresses the deeper systemic issues leading to the rights of certain populations (ex. affluent, caucasian) being upheld more than others (ex. low-income, racialized)
What’s next?
LAND will continue to amplify the voices of those most impacted by environmental harm, and we invite you to join us.
We will be attending the upcoming webinars hosted by ECCC. They are open to all and we understand that during these webinars, we will hear presentations from government officials and subject matter experts, with opportunities for questions and discussion. Descriptions, dates, times and registration links for the webinars are available here and the topics include:
- Systemic nature of environmental racism (February 13, 2025)
- Canada’s history of environmental racism (February 20, 2025)
- Community focused approaches (February 27, 2025)
- Environmental burden and socio-economic impacts (March 6, 2025)
- Restorative justice to repair harm (March 13, 2025)
- The role of data (March 20, 2025)
- Measuring and evaluating progress (March 27, 2024)