A review on solid waste management in Canadian First Nations communities: Policy, practices, and challenges

There is an increasing concern regarding the sustainable solid waste management (SWM) around the world. This review first summarizes First Nations’ social behavior, culture, environmental perspectives, and sustainable development perspectives. The review then introduces the laws and regulations regarding the First Nations SWM system and environment at the federal, provincial, and municipal levels. These laws and regulations can be described as the basic guides, restrictions, and useful improvement tools for First Nations SWM. After this, several technical reports and journal articles focusing on Canada’s Native First Nations are used to provide a comparison between urban and remote communities and allow analyses of three key issues (open dumping, open burning, and COVID-19) so as to describe the current state of Canadian First Nations SWM practices and demonstrate their diversity in Canada. Lastly, the potential First Nations SWM improvement strategies are introduced through education and training, process improvement, and zero-waste possibilities.