Preface

For centuries, Inuvialuit inhabiting the Inuvialuit Settlement Region (ISR) built a comprehensive information system to inform their lives. Land, and water-based knowledge, cultural knowledge, subsistence living, medicinal knowledge, transfer of language and storytelling, and kinship roles were amongst the information systems that were intact for multiple generations.

The Inuvialuit Regional Corporation (IRC) recognized a need to produce indicators about Inuvialuit living in the ISR – making summary information available to support evidenced based planning and decision making. As a result, the IRC requested the collection, development, and dissemination of statistical indicators to document the conditions of people in the region. One of the approved objectives, was the development of a printed and electronic handbook containing a series of statistical indicators about Inuvialuit.

As Inuvialuit continue to move forward on self-determination in research, it is important that information is accessible and community decision making and planning be supported by evidence-based data. The purpose of the Inuvialuit Settlement Region Handbook is to provide statistical indicators about Inuvialuit. The handbook contains summary indicators about the population, and socioeconomic conditions in the ISR. The majority of indicators for this book are extracted from the 2021 Census of Canada. Other sources include Statistics Canada, Northwest Territories Bureau of Statistics, IRC internal sources, and Environment Canada. The handbook is divided into region, population, household, language, labour force, education, income, prices, dwellings, traditional activities and community sections.