"There are no borders for us": Trump tariffs pose existential threat to Northern Ontario Indigenous communities

Bingwi Neyaashi Anishinaabek - U.S. President Donald Trump announced after being sworn in on Monday that he intends to sign an executive order imposing a 25% tariff on all goods transported across the border from Canada, which could take effect as early as February 1.

He added in a speech at the World Economic Forum on Thursday that the U.S. does not need Canada's resources because it has abundant domestic resources, and that its trade deficit with Canada is $200 billion to $250 billion.

If Trump follows through on this threat, experts predict Canada could lose 1.5 million jobs. The resource extraction industries that many parts of Northern Ontario's economy depend on would be hit hard.

The Ontario Mining Association has not yet calculated the potential impact of tariffs on the north, which has 36 active mines that produced minerals worth $15.7 billion in 2023. In a written statement provided to Ricochet, Ontario Mining Association President Priya Tandon said the prospect of a 25% across-the-board tariff is "definitely concerning." She added that the association is working with members and governments to assess its impact. Ian Dunn, president of the Ontario Forest Industries Association, was more direct.

"If it actually happens, and this rate of precipitation stays at around 25% for a long period of time, our forest industry will be destroyed to a very large extent," Dunn said.

According to him, 97% of Ontario's forest products cross the Canada-U.S. border. Dunn said simple calculations put $2 billion of the industry's $8 billion in output at risk.

Lumber exports are the most vulnerable. The U.S. already imposes a 14% tariff on lumber, which is expected to increase by 35% in November. If Trump's promised tariffs come to pass, Canadian lumber exports would face a 60% cost increase before entering their near-exclusive market in the U.S.

An existential threat to some Indigenous communities

If trade winds shift so quickly and dramatically, it could be existential for Bingwi Neyaashi Anishinaabek (Sand Point First Nation), whose leaders are counting on a small sawmill to bring members home.

The mill on Lake Nipigon employs only five people and is a small part of the supply chain for the Resolute sawmill 180 kilometres southwest of Thunder Bay.

Ontario expropriated the reserve in the 1950s to build a provincial park. Members were dispersed and did not gain the right to move back until 2010.

Today, only 30 people remain on the reserve. The plan is to expand the sawmill until it can produce structural lumber for building homes for members returning to the land.

Under the right conditions, with sawmill and other derivative products from the million-hectare Nipigon Lake forest managed by Indigenous people in the region, Bingwi Neyaashi Anishinaabek could build a sustainable economy.

Those conditions could actually get worse.

"We're all holding our breath," said Jordan Hatton, economic development director for Bingwi Neyaashi Anishinaabek. "Not just for Sand Point, not just for the sawmill, but for other projects or developments we have going on right now. There's a lot of uncertainty, and uncertainty breeds fear because we don't know right now."

Yet amid the fear and uncertainty, some in the business community believe that invoking a 230-year-old law to counter Trump's proposed tariffs could present the biggest opportunity ever for Indigenous-owned resource companies.

Jason Thompson, past president of the Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce, believes now is the time to test the Jay Treaty.

What is the Jay Treaty?

In 1794, the U.S. and Britain signed the Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation, known as the Jay Treaty. It resolved outstanding issues after the American Revolutionary War and recognized the right of Indigenous people born on both sides of the Canada-U.S. border to freely work and travel across it.

"For us, there is no border," Thompson said. "There was only a border after Canada and the U.S. were created."

Indigenous people can cross the border with status cards, letters of ancestry, or letters from the U.S. side certifying they have "at least 50% 'American Indian blood,' so-called blood quantum."

For goods, it's complicated.

In 1948 and 1950, Canada twice confiscated a washing machine, a refrigerator, and an oil heater that a member of the St. Regis Indian Reserve (Akwesasne 59) brought across the border from New York State into Quebec. He protested and paid $123.66 in duties, then challenged the charge under the following provision of the Jay Treaty: "No duty of entry shall ever be levied by either party on peltries brought by land or inland navigation into the said territories, nor shall Indians passing or repassing with their own proper goods and effects of whatever nature, pay for the same any impost or duty whatever. But goods in bales or other large packages unusual among Indians shall not be considered as goods belonging bona fide to Indians."

In 1956, the Supreme Court of Canada declared the Jay Treaty's provisions on Indigenous travel and trade inapplicable because the treaty was abrogated during the War of 1812. Moreover, Parliament never passed legislation or a regulatory framework for cross-border Indigenous trade.

But Indigenous people have continued to fight for these rights. A decade ago, the federal government agreed to hear their concerns, which Canada expressed in a 2016 Senate report. That report focused on mobility, not commercial interests. At the end of that process, at the request of the Akwesasne Mohawks, Canada introduced a digital status card for individual cross-border use in 2019.

In 2021, Canada passed the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and released an implementation action plan in 2023, after which dialogue accelerated further.

Canada has not made any specific commitments on cross-border Indigenous business trade. But Thompson said Indigenous communities and business leaders have been meeting during this time to test the market for potential international agreements.

As a board member of the Anishinabek Business Professional Association, he has learned about a three-year deepening plan among Indigenous business leaders, particularly in the resource extraction industry, aimed at integrating economies and bypassing colonial government regulation.

"Any resource-based sector - whether mining, energy, forestry, or otherwise - both countries are eager to cooperate between nations. I think this (Trump's tariff threat) will help kick-start that process and get it done faster," Thompson said.

To implement this strategy, someone must take the risk of exercising the Jay Treaty's Indigenous trade provisions through the courts. Indigenous people doing business with U.S. tribes would have to challenge paying border fees, arguing that their nation-to-nation agreements take precedence over Trump's tariffs. But given the stakes, that could happen soon.

"As an Indigenous person, I'm very excited to see Indigenous organizations mobilizing around the Jay Treaty to push it and test it," said John Desjarlais, executive director of the Indigenous Resource Network.

"It's one of the oldest treaties affecting border trade. It's a fantastic opportunity to push border trade and build nation-to-nation trade where you can be exempt from these tariffs without having to worry about posturing. Then you can build stronger, more resilient, more sustainable economies on top of that."

The Indigenous Resource Network is an advocacy organization for Indigenous workers and business owners in the resource industry. Desjarlais said statistically, Indigenous workers have the most precarious labour conditions.

For example, while mining employs 17,300 Indigenous people in Canada, the economic health of their communities is also directly tied to the success of projects that could become casualties of a trade war.

"Many of these industries are the primary source of income for these communities. They're more vulnerable because they don't have the capacity to pivot to different industries," Desjarlais said.

Since 2000, Indigenous communities across Canada have signed 524 resource agreements with governments and exploration and resource extraction companies. In Northern Ontario, these agreements are often project-specific contracts between companies and the nearest First Nation.

But in 2018, Ontario signed a revenue-sharing agreement with Grand Council Treaty #3, Wabun, and Mushkegowuk Council, promising a share of revenue from resources extracted within their territories. This opened the door for 41 First Nations in Northern Ontario to tie economic growth to resource extraction.

Desjarlais is most familiar with efforts by Saskatchewan First Nations to vertically integrate the value chain, from forest management to logging to finished product manufacturing. He believes those with more developed Indigenous resource economies are best positioned to assert international law and develop Indigenous trade networks independent of Canada or the U.S.

A high-stakes gamble

This may seem a far cry from Bingwi Neyaashi Anishinaabek's five-employee sawmill, but the stakes are equally high. Hatton's community has bet its future on forestry for resettlement.

His staff may not be able to break through the border on their own, but if Indigenous communities and companies carve out an exclusive resource trade route in the Midwest, even small players could gain a considerable comparative advantage from tariff exemptions.

"In the past, we've been looking at potential opportunities for tribal trade with U.S. and Canadian Indigenous people," Hatton said. "I think the tariff issue could bring about that shift. BNA is very interested in these conversations. We're not at the forefront yet by any means, but we want to see where it goes. Because if these tariffs take effect, what are the alternatives? This could be one of them."

Source: https://www.snnewswatch.com/local-news/there-is-no-border-for-us-trump-tariffs-represent-an-existential-threat-to-northern-ontario-first-nations-10129938?utm_source=tbnewswatch.com&utm_campaign=tbnewswatch.com%3A%20outbound&utm_medium=referral