Western Standard - Finding a pathway through shared prosperity

00:00:00.000 I'm sitting with Shauna Martineau of the Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation and well

00:00:17.660 we're talking energy and talking Indigenous involvement so thank you very much for joining

00:00:22.120 us today to explain what your corporation's about. Thanks so much for having me it's a pleasure to be

00:00:27.900 here. So it's been a big issue a lot lately Indigenous participation in the energy sector

00:00:34.120 partnerships you know no longer just talking about working around Indigenous nations but

00:00:40.720 actually involving them in the projects I believe that's part of the focus of what you guys are about

00:00:45.000 and helping facilitate. Yeah absolutely Corey thanks so much for asking and we're really about

00:00:50.820 supporting Indigenous investment so the Conservative government in 2019 really saw a gap in the

00:00:57.780 ability for Indigenous nations to access financing to become full equity partners at the table for

00:01:03.460 energy projects and we were focused solely on energy when we started in 2019. This has been a really

00:01:10.020 important step it's it's coming together to share the opportunity and the risk of energy projects with

00:01:18.720 our Indigenous neighbours I'm First Nation so I will say also my home nation and the Métis communities in

00:01:24.320 our province it's been a really exciting development it's one that the world is noticing other

00:01:29.600 jurisdictions in our country are copying Alberta's approach or emulating Alberta's approach I should

00:01:35.120 say and finding this is a finding a pathway through to shared prosperity through large-scale infrastructure

00:01:43.120 projects in our province. Yeah so they've kind of there's a lot of interest from the Indigenous

00:01:47.520 communities I mean people kind of think that there's a blanket opposition to energy development I think

00:01:51.520 a lot of it is just that they just want to make sure that they're participants in it and then benefiting

00:01:55.120 it from like anybody else. Absolutely and and due to restrictions in the Indian Act it's really tough for

00:02:00.480 Indigenous communities to borrow money in a traditional way and then you layer on you know various other

00:02:06.560 challenges with you know systemic racism issues and legacies of colonialism and that's just made it

00:02:12.720 impossible to have a full seat at the table and so really this is a new path forward and and I really

00:02:19.360 applaud the energy companies I think there are many many companies especially in Alberta that have led

00:02:25.760 the desire for this program so companies like Enbridge, Tamarack Valley, Strathcona Resources they have all

00:02:32.240 embarked on partnerships with Indigenous communities and they have said to governments not only in

00:02:37.200 Alberta but nationally that we need these programs because it's good for our business too. Yeah and I

00:02:43.680 mean it just facilitates the smooth you know cooperation with people in those areas that are impacted by

00:02:48.480 energy development and projects. Absolutely. So this is more it's not a direct subsidy thing a lot of

00:02:53.280 it's loan guarantees and the financing as opposed to you know a handout which could be problematic.

00:02:58.640 Absolutely so it's a very very small impact to the Alberta balance sheet so basically what we do is

00:03:06.800 we act almost like a co-signer for the loan so if you think about you know your young teenager wants

00:03:13.120 to buy a car and the bank won't lend them money so you get the one of the parents to co-sign the loan

00:03:17.920 and the parent only pays the loan if if the payments are missed it's it's a very similar story so think about

00:03:23.680 us doing large-scale mortgages instead of on a home purchase it's a power plan or a pipeline and that's

00:03:29.360 basically how it works and so if we're doing our job well at the Alberta Indigenous Opportunities

00:03:34.640 Corporation then the province guarantees the debt but there's no impact to the citizens of Alberta from

00:03:42.080 that from that endeavor. Yeah it's presumed it'll be repaid like any other loan. That's right it's our

00:03:46.800 job to make sure it's a credit worthy deal that that happens. So do you work with with smaller

00:03:50.720 interest smaller businesses and startups or is this all larger uh initiatives? So we don't support

00:03:57.520 entrepreneurial entrepreneurial business we support nation level investments so Vétis settlements

00:04:03.120 um and First Nations so and that's an important part that we're not interrupting that cycle of capital

00:04:09.040 we're not interrupting the entrepreneurial ecosystem we are supporting a gap in capital for

00:04:14.560 uh a nation level investment and then the the communities then use the net proceeds so the loan

00:04:21.760 gets paid back the nation gets the the proceeds in the uh for what the business makes over and above the

00:04:27.440 loan payment and then they use that to invest in their community so think arenas roads uh Frog Lake my home

00:04:34.320 nation is building some water infrastructure really important um community developments that that everyone

00:04:40.800 can benefit from. Yeah and just to expand I guess a little on you know some people don't necessarily

00:04:44.720 understand why Indigenous communities have a harder time with traditional financing than others I mean

00:04:48.960 most communities rely well they'll have a capital asset they can sort of leverage to you know hold

00:04:54.800 in case there's a loan problem or something like that but there's not this traditional ownership like

00:04:58.880 we imagine on the reserves they can't liquidate a part of the reserve to uh pay for a loan. And you can't hold

00:05:04.160 it as collateral because you don't own it. Yeah. So any reserve land is crown land and due to restrictions

00:05:09.600 in the Indian Act you cannot hold that land as collateral. So I as a First Nations person as a

00:05:15.360 treaty person cannot take a mortgage on a home on reserve in the same way that someone else can take

00:05:20.160 a mortgage on a home somewhere else. And so when you think about the ways that that wealth is grown

00:05:26.160 that assets are grown typically it involves debt and so um opening up the Indian Act is a very

00:05:33.040 problematic type of um endeavor there's there's lots to that it's like renegotiating the constitution

00:05:38.720 and so what the Alberta government has done and other governments have followed suit is to come

00:05:42.560 with these loan guarantee programs as a way to address restrictions there that are holding Indigenous

00:05:47.840 people back. So are there some existing projects now on the go that you guys have already facilitated?

00:05:53.200 We have so far facilitated investments in nine transactions 43 Indigenous communities in our

00:05:58.960 province that's both First Nations and Métis settlements have invested in those large-scale

00:06:04.240 infrastructure projects they're all on our website there's a variety of projects there's many more

00:06:08.160 on the go and we believe that the net returns on those investments net of loan payments will earn

00:06:17.200 those communities back 1.4 billion dollars over the life of the loan guarantees and so that's money

00:06:23.280 that's going into things like I said other business development roads water treatment facilities

00:06:29.680 um community centers things that are sorely lacking in Indigenous communities I know um there are many

00:06:36.720 that have trouble with just basic power and and clean drinking water and so really really important

00:06:42.240 for a way for them to self-fund the needs of their communities. So there's much of course we're at the

00:06:48.240 global energy show so it's an energy focus but beyond that there's some other initiatives and types of

00:06:53.520 industries that you guys are helping some communities get financing with? Absolutely so our mandate covers everything from

00:06:59.520 agriculture to telecom and um technology now that's been recently announced and so what is important

00:07:07.040 there is that the Alberta government is saying we want to support Indigenous investment in all aspects of

00:07:12.000 our economy um the energy sector clearly is the economic growth engine of our province and our country

00:07:18.640 and so it's important that Indigenous people have an involvement there but it also that there's future

00:07:23.280 economic opportunities and growth and that Indigenous people are there as well and stronger healthier

00:07:29.200 Indigenous communities really benefits every single person in our province. Oh absolutely and I mean

00:07:34.160 just the business involvement and development the things you're creating a new generation of people

00:07:38.080 to look forward to other investments as you go farther down and a break out of the cycle that some

00:07:42.240 people are stuck in right? Absolutely and when when you think about it um I always think about it as like

00:07:46.960 a pebble dropping in a pond the ripples outward so when we talk about white fish good fish like First Nation they

00:07:52.800 built a community center with some of the proceeds of their investments and when you think about that that's

00:07:58.000 procurement that's jobs that's construction materials that's all sourced likely from the region right

00:08:04.640 it's more employment it's then it's long-term employment and it's also the community center is

00:08:10.000 an arena it's a healthy place to hold hockey tournaments ringette tournaments it's a place to have

00:08:14.560 summer activities a place to gather yeah it's a social hub for not only their community but all the

00:08:19.520 communities around them as well so when you just think about the economic growth from just that one

00:08:26.160 investment and how that positively impacts outward all the entire region I think the future looks a

00:08:33.040 lot brighter as a result of these investments great well so uh before I let you go is there more you'd

00:08:38.480 like to add and also where would people find out more information about your corporation so they could

00:08:41.920 follow up on it absolutely so we we are active on social media so facebook linkedin those kinds of

00:08:48.240 things we have a website that's www.theaioc.com and so all of our projects are listed there you can

00:08:55.600 find out more about it and there's also your ability to reach out to our teams and so we're looking forward

00:09:01.760 to the uh the new government's focus on building infrastructure I think right across our country and

00:09:08.880 we're hopeful that indigenous people can be fully at the table to participate in that great well I thank you

00:09:14.240 for the the work you guys are doing I'm looking forward to seeing some good you know projects

00:09:17.840 coming up and more participation this is so much bad us versus them sort of attitude when it really

00:09:22.320 shouldn't be it should be a partnership we're stronger together and I think I think Canadians are

00:09:27.040 starting to realize that the us versus them might not be internal and that we're stronger together

00:09:32.080 both across our country and with indigenous peoples and um and I'm I'm forward I'm looking forward to

00:09:38.800 what how we proceed from here great well thank you again for spending some time and explaining that

00:09:44.160 to us and I'll let you get back to the show here great thanks so much all right thank you

Western Standard - June 15, 2025

Finding a pathway through shared prosperity

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