Thank you, Madam Chair. This amendment is in response to testimony—I think every member remembers how much information we heard from indigenous peoples, particularly from the Assembly of First Nations. We've already touched on it in the clause-by-clause today, the fact that “traditional knowledge” as a term is problematic. We've seen it now as also uncertain, particularly if you think of “traditional” in the sense of being frozen-in-time, as picture knowledge in a Mason jar, and sealed as is. Indigenous people have talked to us about the fact that there are innovations, new understandings that come from indigenous knowledge systems. We don't want to have a definition of traditional knowledge that excludes the way in which indigenous information evolves over time. Indigenous knowledge systems deliver information in a way that we want to continue to access.
I've changed the definition on page eight, after line 36, to say, “traditional knowledge of the Indigenous peoples of Canada includes information acquired from Indigenous knowledge systems.”
This is directly from briefs. In the bill there's no definition. I've inserted it between “sustainability” and “rights of indigenous peoples”. Later on I actually change it. There's a similar change made down the bill at my 84th amendment.
Going back to this one, I'm inserting a new definition between “sustainability” and “rights of indigenous peoples” to create clarity around what we mean by “traditional knowledge.”