The 2016-21 Strategic Plan is structured around four key commitments including “Indigenous: Creating, Knowing and Sharing” that acknowledges the cultural sovereignty of Indigenous peoples and respects the concepts of First Nations, Inuit and Métis self-determination. The Canada Council through this program, affirms the following guiding principles: 

• Respect Indigenous worldviews, and the rights of Indigenous Peoples, as articulated in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2007)
• Support and uphold the principles of reconciliation, articulated through the report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (2015)
• Support artistic activities that respect and encourage First Nations, Inuit and Métis cultural self-determination and the vitality of Indigenous artistic practices and communities
• Recognize the distinct and unique place of First Nations, Inuit and Métis artists in Canada as creators, interpreters, translators and transmitters of an inherent Indigenous cultural continuity, as well as unique contributions made to Canadian cultural identity
• Recognize and support customary and contemporary artistic practices by First Nations, Inuit and Métis artists
• Support and develop a Canadian arts landscape that is deeply ingrained with perspectives, voices, stories, struggles and aesthetics of the First Nations, Inuit and Métis Peoples of Canada
• Recognize the distinctiveness of the many unique and self-defining First Nations, Inuit and Métis communities in Canada
• Recognize a wide variety of artistic and cultural practitioners within First Nations, Inuit and Métis communities