Meegwetch.
Aanii. Tabatha Bull n'indignikaaz, Nipissing n'indoonjibaa, Migizi dodem.
Hello. My name is Tabatha Bull, and I'm a member of Nipissing First Nation.
As president and CEO of Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business, CCAB, I want to thank you, Mr. Chair, and all distinguished members of the committee for the opportunity to provide you with my testimony and to contribute to this very important work.
Speaking to you from my home office, I acknowledge the land as the traditional territory of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, Anishinabe, Chippewa, Haudenosaunee and Wendat peoples.
Since 1984 CCAB has been committed to the full participation of indigenous peoples in the Canadian economy. Our work, programs and priorities are all backed by data-driven research. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the indigenous economy was experiencing a period of sustained growth. Indigenous businesses made impressive gains in the areas of entrepreneurship and individual economic achievement despite the barriers that exist. At that time, there were over 50,000 self-employed indigenous people across Canada and over 250 indigenous economic development corporations. The last two years have been a difficult time for businesses across the country. We have seen barriers specific to indigenous businesses more starkly than ever before.
CCAB, with our partners at NACCA and NIEDB, undertook three COVID-19 indigenous business surveys supported by Indigenous Services Canada. We found that indigenous businesses continued to experience negative impacts due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Two-thirds said the COVID-19 pandemic had negatively impacted their business operation.
We acknowledge the work of the Government of Canada to introduce efforts to provide supports for businesses through the pandemic. A number of those supports required changes to ensure that indigenous businesses were included. While access was made available for most, we still see persistent barriers. Of the 66% of respondents who still indicate that they require financial assistance, almost two-thirds did not apply for any government support. A third did not apply because they believed they would not qualify, and nearly a quarter indicated that they did not know about what supports were available.
An increasing number of businesses report low credit ratings or limited cash savings as a barrier to accessing government supports. Businesses also indicated such obstacles as having a payroll of less than $20,000, insufficient short-term cash flow, lack of access and the requirement to have a CRA or business registration number.
When asked what skills and training indigenous businesses need, over half of the respondents selected support for grant and application proposal writing. CCAB has repeatedly highlighted the need for a navigator function specific to indigenous business to assist with the understanding and uptake of the various programs. We were pleased to see a navigator position indicated in Minister Hajdu's mandate letter. This will be critical, as indigenous businesses found navigating the bureaucracy, which often does not consider their unique legal and place-based circumstances, a significant barrier to accessing supports and business development programs.
I use these examples of COVID programming to provide specific illustrations of barriers, but these barriers exist across government. What is lacking and what we would like to see as a recommendation by this committee is a comprehensive federal government-wide strategy driven by indigenous peoples to support the [Technical difficulty—Editor]. An indigenous entrepreneurship strategy would make indigenous prosperity a priority for every federal department, agency and regulator, and provide the necessary down payment to support economic reconciliation.
Although we acknowledge the number of important renewed commitments on accelerating reconciliation, I would be remiss if I did not express our disappointment that there is rarely mention of efforts to support the economic empowerment of indigenous peoples [Technical difficulty—Editor] community for the government to signal to Canadians that indigenous prosperity matters.
The CCAB believes that an indigenous entrepreneurship strategy should include the following three key pillars: access to procurement and program opportunities, access to markets and supply chain networks, and access to funding.
With respect to procurement, CCAB, with other national indigenous organizations [Technical difficulty—Editor] the Government of Canada's 5% procurement target, a goal first proposed in CCAB's “Industry and Inclusion” report in 2019. Together, we have also provided a series of papers to the Government of Canada that outline practical solutions to increase procurement from indigenous business. We see eliminating the barriers to federal procurement, in addition to infrastructure set-asides for indigenous businesses and communities, as critical steps to indigenous economic development.
Through our “supply change” initiative, we have seen corporate Canada's spend with indigenous business far exceed that of the federal government's. It continues to outgrow the pace at which the federal government is moving. We are here to assist all federal partners to meet their indigenous procurement targets.
I would like to leave you with this point for consideration. Too often indigenous business concerns are an afterthought, resulting in indigenous organizations, like us and our friends at other national indigenous organizations, working to remedy programs and policies after the fact.
We are committed to continuing to work in collaboration with the government, our members and partners to help rebuild and strengthen the path towards a healthy and prosperous Canada.
Thank you, all, for your time.
I welcome the opportunity to answer your questions.
Chi-meegwetch.