Heiltsuk Aquaponics Project

Growing Community-Led Food Solutions Through Innovation and Youth Engagement

In Bella Bella, Heiltsuk Climate Action is planting the seeds for long-term food security through innovation, youth leadership, and deep community collaboration. With support from the Indigenous Food Security and Sovereignty Grant, the Nation is developing an aquaponics system—but the real foundation is built on people.

What’s Happening in Heiltsuk Territory

Before designing the system, the team met with community members to understand what food security meant to them, what barriers they faced, and how they could get involved. That groundwork shaped the project into something grounded in collective vision—not just technology.

They then partnered with local students and youth, ensuring the system wouldn’t just serve the community—but be sustained by it. By creating space for young people to lead, learn, and shape the future of food in Heiltsuk territory, this project is about more than growing food—it’s about growing capacity.

As shared in the video, “This is something the youth can take on, grow with, and one day pass on. That’s how it becomes sustainable.”

Community-Led Food Security Across BC First Nations

Across British Columbia, BC First Nations are leading food security projects rooted in their own realities. For remote Nations like Heiltsuk, aquaponics offers a way to produce food locally while addressing the rising cost and limited access to fresh goods. But it’s the people—their input, ideas, and involvement—that truly power the system.

About the Indigenous Food Security and Sovereignty Grant

This grant provides non-repayable funding to First Nation communities, Indigenous organizations, and entrepreneurs in BC working to strengthen Indigenous food systems. Eligible projects include local food production, harvesting, preservation, education, and innovative systems like aquaponics.