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Indigenous Markets

This transcript has been generated using machine learning technology. While this technology was trained with CIBC terminology, it may contain errors.
Jaimie Lickers, Senior Vice-President, Indigenous Markets: First Nations and Indigenous communities are not strangers to volatility. They&#8217;ve faced centuries of economic marginalization, systemic discrimination, and just general barriers to their economic participation. I actually think that the external volatility that we&#8217;re seeing in the markets today could accelerate the realization of certain participation and opportunities for Indigenous communities.
For example, I was in London this spring speaking at an international Indigenous Investment Summit where a lot of foreign investors were asking the question of where they could invest their capital to support Indigenous communities in Canada. This uncertainty and volatility is creating capital that is looking for, perhaps a new home.
And there are a lot of investors on the international stage that are looking to see their investments make a greater impact for distinct communities, of which Canada&#8217;s Indigenous people are at the top of, of that list. We’re also seeing extensive discussion domestically about our economic sovereignty and our security.
So, I&#8217;m hearing a lot of discussion around Arctic sovereignty, for example, and protecting our security in that part of our territory. There is great, opportunity for Indigenous communities in, in the north, in the territories to play a central role in our Arctic security, in addition, of course, to the opportunities that exist across the country in the major project space for which we&#8217;ve had extensive discussion, both by me by other prominent Indigenous business people,
Mark Podlasly, for example, with the First Nations Major Projects coalition. So this avenue of economic participation in supporting major projects across the country is not a new opportunity, but it is one that I think we will see, greater optimization and realization as a result of the volatility that we&#8217;re seeing in the global market today. There is a considerable interest right now in the creation of products in the investment and asset management space that could have a greater impact on Indigenous communities. We&#8217;re seeing both Indigenous investors and non-Indigenous investors that are asking questions around how they can ensure that their investments are not only generating a return for the investor, but are also generating positive impacts in particular communities.
And some of those investments might focus on social outcomes, they might focus on ESG factors, or they might focus on Indigenous communities. So we&#8217;re seeing a great demand for products that would have positive impacts in Indigenous communities, coupled with an interest from Indigenous communities themselves in using their own assets to benefit either their own community or other Indigenous communities in Canada.
The second major opportunity is in the Arctic security and sovereignty discussion that we&#8217;re having as a nation. You can&#8217;t have Arctic sovereignty and security without the participation of northern Indigenous communities. They will have to play a central role both in the actualization of any project around our security in the North, but also in the sharing of generations of knowledge as to how we secure those territories. We&#8217;re also seeing an interest from foreign investment in looking at opportunities to support Indigenous communities in Canada, similar to the asset management opportunity, where investors are looking at how they can make sure that their investments are positively impacting Indigenous communities in Canada.
We have foreign investors that are looking for a new place for their capital to earn revenue. And many of those investors are looking at Indigenous communities in Canada. There is a considerable infrastructure gap for Indigenous communities in Canada, and that creates a lot of opportunity for investment in infrastructure, investments to support raising the standard of living for Indigenous communities while also ensuring that we&#8217;re closing that infrastructure gap.
The opportunity for greater Indigenous participation in major projects in Canada has been discussed at good length by me and others in the space and I don&#8217;t foresee that changing in the near future. The federal Indigenous Loan Guarantee Program is having an impact, and that&#8217;s quite an accomplishment given that the program was just announced late last year. Under Prime Minister Carney, this Liberal government has doubled its commitment to the program, announcing in this year&#8217;s budget that the program, the availability of the guarantees would be increased to $10 billion.
So, in May of this year, CDEV and its subsidiary made an announcement that it would be supporting 36 First Nations communities in their investment in an ownership stake of Enbridge&#8217;s West Coast natural gas pipeline system. And that investment came with a $400 million loan guarantee under the Indigenous Loan Guarantee Program for the purchase of a 12.5% equity stake in that project. CIBC Capital Markets was proud to participate in that transaction as a financial advisor to the Canada Indigenous Loan Guarantee Corporation, and we understand that this is the first of many transactions that will be supported through that program that the CILGP has a substantial list of other projects for which the guarantees might be suitable, which they&#8217;re already assessing, and I think we&#8217;ll see continued participation of equity purchase in deals in major projects in Canada under this program.
I think right now we&#8217;re seeing considerable opposition to two pieces of legislation that have the potential to significantly impact the assertion of of First Nations rights, and that is the legislation that has been passed by the federal government bill C-5 and, a similar legislation, which is passed in Ontario called Bill Five, both of which have as one of their objectives to streamline various approval processes related to certain projects.
And generally speaking, it is good economically for those approval processes to be streamlined for things to be able to happen more quickly so that we don&#8217;t miss opportunities in our own domestic economy. But the concern we&#8217;re hearing from First Nations across the country is that, that streamlining has the potential to sideline meaningful engagement with Indigenous communities to supersede Indigenous rights, to be properly engaged and to participate in those projects that may be happening within their territories and it has the potential to significantly undermine what I think is considerable progress that we&#8217;ve made in the Crown &#8211; Indigenous relationship over the last number of years. Whether it comes to pass that either of those pieces of legislation are actually used to sideline Indigenous engagement and Indigenous rights, just the existence of, of this legislation and the concern, the concern that nations weren&#8217;t properly engaged and consulted on the legislation itself, really has the potential to undermine all of the gains that that we&#8217;ve made in the last number of years in fostering better Crown-Indigenous relations.

Building prosperity: updates from the Indigenous economy in Canada