Nature guardians: Why Indigenous people are vital for saving biodiversity

Activists carrying caribou artwork as they protest the United Nations Biodiversity Conference (COP15) during the March for Biodiversity for Human Rights in Montreal, Quebec, Canada on Dec 10. Photo: Alexis Aubin/AFP

For countless generations prior to European colonisation, Canada's Indigenous people relied on caribou both as a source of subsistence and as an integral part of their cultural practices.Hunting and butchering the animal in frigid temperatures was long seen as a rite of passage, and members of the First Nations were the first to detect their serious decline.

"Fundamentally we are people of caribou," Valerie Courtois, director of Canada's Indigenous Leadership Initiative and a member of the Innu nation, said.