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Statistics about Indigenous Women in Canada

September 5, 2024

1. Indigenous women victims of homicide

While they represent only 4% of all women in Canada, Indigenous women make up 26% (53 out of 203 women) of homicides perpetrated against women in 2022.

Source: Statistics Canada, Number of homicide victims, by Indigenous identity and gender, March 21, 2024

2. Indigenous women victims of domestic femicide

Nearly half (47%) of Indigenous women aged 15 and older who were murdered between 2015 and 2020 were killed by an intimate partner

Source: Statistics Canada, Victimization of First Nations people, Métis and Inuit in Canada, July 19, 2022

3. Indigenous women victims to sexual abuse in their childhood

More than one-quarter (26%) of Indigenous women experienced sexual violence by an adult during their childhood.

Source: Statistics Canada, Victimization of First Nations people, Métis and Inuit in Canada, July 19, 2022

4. Indigenous girls in state care and its impact

Indigenous women (11%) were almost six times more likely than non-Indigenous women to have ever been under the legal responsibility of the government and about eight in ten (81%) Indigenous women who were ever under the legal responsibility of the government have experienced lifetime violent victimization.

Source: Statistics Canada, Violent victimization and perceptions of safety: Experiences of First Nations, Métis and Inuit women in Canada, April 26, 2022

5. Hyper criminalization and incarceration of female Indigenous youth

Although Indigenous females are only 4% of the population of females in Canada, they make up 54% of the population of female youth in detention and prison.

Source: Statistics Canada, Youth admissions to correctional services, by Indigenous identity and sex, March 19, 2024

6. Indigenous women victims of sexual harassment in the workplace

Rates of those who ever experienced harassment or sexual assault in the workplace were 43% among Indigenous women.

Source: Statistics Canada, Gender Results Framework: A new data table on workplace harassment, February 12, 2024

7. Food insecurity of Indigenous women

In 2022, almost half (48%) of single mothers below the poverty line and 40% above the poverty line struggled with food insecurity. The rate of food insecurity was highest among Indigenous and Black single mothers.

Source: Statistics Canada, Food insecurity among Canadian families, November 14, 2023 

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Read Also

We do not accept murder, rape, wife battering and incest as inevitable and we do not accept prostitution as inevitable. These are all acts done by men to women in patriarchal world where the relationship between men and women are based on domination and subordination. We do not accept that this kind of relationships between men and women are inevitable. Learning that Indigenous women in pre-colonial Canada were treated in their nations with respect and honor, gives us hope. It reinforces our refusal to accept women’s oppression as inevitable. Knowing that fairly recently in human history, women had social and spiritual roles that were regarded as valuable as those men had, makes our fight for liberation not only possible, but tangible.

By Hilla Kerner
December 2018

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