The BC Assembly of First Nations has created economic development toolkits called the Blackbooks. These have been designed for First Nations Leaders, Band-owned businesses and First Nations entrepreneurs. The sessions were free for First Nations,
The Blackbook builds off the rounds of regional engagement that BCAFN has done over the last few years. That information was being used to develop a bit of a large scale economic development strategy, with one of the components being an Economic Development toolkit (The Blackbook). The document has a focus on:
- Understanding and developing an Economic Development Strategy,
- Framing out some considerations for a structure,
- Some more detailed aspects to project planning,
- Infrastructure considerations, and
- Information for understanding the impact of economic development initiatives.
In short, the Blackbook provides information and tools to assist in each of these topics.
The second portion of this initiative is a compilation of additional resources to be used and referenced along the way. This combination of information and resources is intended to put something practical and useful in the hands of Nations. Participants were invited into the broader economic strategy work, to then present the toolkit (mid-level overview), and seek some general input as somewhat of a “check-in” on the document and resources that have been created.
These sessions took place between October and December 2018.