Blueprints for a Rooted Economy: Indigenomics 

What’s the greatest comeback Canada has never seen?  

According to special guest Carol Ann Hilton, Founder and CEO of the Indigenomics Institute, it’s re-centering Indigenous economic power and Indigenous participation. But part of that re-centering requires acknowledging that Canada was formed through Indigenous economic and cultural exclusion and that this exclusion has an impacted all Canadians, even generations far removed from the Indian Act. 

In this episode, host Marwa Abdou and Carol Anne Hilton unpack Indigenomics: a framework for redesigning economic systems around reciprocity, responsibility, and relationship to land. Together they explore how 150 years of exclusion produced today’s inequalities, why corporate Canada has a duty under Truth and Reconciliation Call to Action 92, and what it means to build economies where land is law, stewardship is strategy, and growth is measured through shared prosperity. 

Their conversation flows from examples of how Indigenous businesses operate from fundamentally different values, prioritizing community, future generations, and responsibility, all the way to the radical concept of “land as law” — starting with responsibility rather than impact assessment — and its role in reshaping infrastructure development. From clean energy and procurement reform to “land as governance,” this episode challenges listeners to rethink what reconciliation looks like — not as ceremony, but as economic design.