audio, stills, text and or video: Go to zReportage.com to see more - The Inuit and Innu have occupied Labrador for thousands of years. It's called the Big Land, and with almost 300,000 sq km sprawling north toward the Arctic Circle, it's easy to see why. Sparse, rocky, puddled expanses form the primeval landscape. The Innu people of the remote community of Davis Inlet, on the coast of Labrador, were relocated to Natuashish in a desperate attempt to fix a broken native community, once Canada's most notorious. The Innu residents of Davis Inlet historically were forced by the government to abandon their nomadic lifestyle and found themselves slipping out of touch with their traditional way of life. Rates of alcoholism and suicide increased and few resources were allocated to support the community who lived in sub-standard conditions. More than a decade later, suicide and crime rates are down, and elders are working to reconnect young people with the land, but the problems still run deep. An evaluation of the government-funded Labrador Innu Healing Strategy says there is virtually no progress in improving the social welfare of the community.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 18, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - The Aurora Borealis, or Northern Lights, as seen from Natuashish.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 20, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - BRYAN RICH helps to sort out a tangled net before placing it into the waters of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 25, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - A small group of Innu youth head out on their own to find something to hunt in the wilderness near their camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 17, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - PETER GREGOIRE, left, and MARK PASTEEN - two members of the Innu band ''The Gregoire Boys.'' Natuashish, population about 900, was created in 2002 when the government of Newfoundland and Labrador moved the Innu community from the island community of Davis Inlet following a spate of youth suicides and other serious social issues.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 17, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - The town of Natuashish, on the coast of Labrador, photographed during the approach to the gravel strip runway is home to about 900 Innu.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 17, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - Some of the graffiti that is quite commonly found.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 17, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - WAYNE PASTEEN, 27, inside his mother's kitchen. Wayne is one of the few remaining chronic gas sniffers in Natuashish where drug sniffing youth and suicides have plagued this isolated northern community for decades.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 17, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - KATIE PASTEEN holds the hand of her mother, MADELINE RICH, 85, in the Labrador coastal community. Madeline, who was born in the country, and is the daughter of a shaman is the eldest person in this Innu community, now suffers from Alzheimer's Disease.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 18, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - A young man loiters outside the Band Council offices.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 18, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - A youth blocks the camera while another plays with a BB gun while hanging out near the general store.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 19, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - A youth struggles to get his gear in order while hiking through the bush during a hunting outing near the western shores of Mistastin Lake. Community leaders from Natuashish have come to these traditional Innu hunting grounds to help some of their young men and boys discover some of their culture and form better community bonds.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 23, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - WAYNE PASTEEN, 27, the day after a fall storm dumped about two feet of snow at an Innu camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 22, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - WAYNE PASTEEN, 27, prepares to tell his story of addiction to sniffing gas while snowbound in a small cabin at an Innu camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 23, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - Three young men post hole through the snow as they head out into the fresh snow to hunt following a fall storm that left a foot of snow on the ground at an Innu camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 24, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - Innu boys point excitedly at the ridges where caribou were spotted to the north of their hunting camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 20, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - LEON RICH, 10, hops from stone to stone while fishing along the shoreline of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 20, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - WAYNE PASTEEN, 27, carries a large lake trout back to camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 18, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - JAMES POKER, 17, stands in a small clearing in the woods, where he spent many hours sniffing gas with other youth since he was eight years old. Like many young men and women he has attempted suicide, and has recently returned from living in foster homes and attending rehab centres outside of his community.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 18, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - The final resting place of Natuashish's latest suicide victim, James Pokue (June 2, 1991-Sept. 2, 2014) is protected by a brightly painted fence at the crowded cemetery outside of Natuashish. This latest death was the first suicide in the community since Sept. 1, 2009 - a remarkable statistic for a community that grieved four to five suicide victims annually before that.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 19, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - A group of Innu boys take a break from camp chores to play some softball on the shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 19, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - An enthusiastic ALEXIS PASTEEN JAMES, 8, tries to chop wood with an axe he can barely lift, shortly after arriving at an Innu camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 21, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - Children play on an Innu swing, a Ueuepeshun, at an Innu camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 20, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - Natuashish Chief GREGORY RICH scans the ridge-line north of his hunting camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 19, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - WAYNE PASTEEN, 27, smiles freely after arriving by Twin Otter to an Innu camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 23, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - Three young hunters make their way back to camp through deep snow at Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 22, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - WAYNE PASTEEN, 27, walks from his parents cabin to his own during a snowstorm at an Innu camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 21, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - EDITH TSHAKAPESH, 63, quarters a porcupine carcass for cooking the traditional way while LEAH TSHAKAPESH, 7, plays a game on an iPad at left. The pair were among the four females who made the trip to the Innu camp on the western shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com via ZUMA Press
Sept. 28, 2014 - Natuashish, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - CHRISTINE POKER, an addictions counsellor, pauses while telling stories from her youth during an interview at her home.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 21, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - SIMON POKUE, whose son, James ''Jimmy'' Pokue took his own life only 19 days earlier, sits in the doorway of Sebastian Pewash looking out at the waters of Mistastin Lake. Pokue said little on this trip, except that he found the setting ''peaceful.'' His placement in a cabin with Pewash was no accident. Pewash had himself lost a son to suicide while the community was still in Davis Inlet.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
Sept. 25, 2014 - Mastastin Lake, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada - Fifteen-year old TREVOR RICH returns alone from a hunter trip with other youth toward camp on the shores of Mistastin Lake.
© Peter Power/zReportage.com/ZUMA Press
