Free, Prior & Informed Consent
Nothing moves without the Nation's understanding and agreement. FPIC is the floor, not the ceiling.
Indigenous majority-owned and controlled
Our Water. Our Hands.
Our Future.
Sovereign Pure is Indigenous majority-owned and controlled. We move an abundance of pure glacial water into a network our Nations own: the infrastructure, the jobs, the revenue, and the decisions.
Who we are
Built by Indigenous leadership.
Owned at every layer.
Sovereign Pure is led by our President & CEO, Valerie Vanderwyk, a Mi'kmaq leader who has spent her career opening doors for Indigenous people in skilled trades and education. We hold 51% ownership and control of the national company, and every community venture in our network is majority-owned by its Nation. Our supply partner, Arctic Freshwater, brings the water, the logistics, and the technology, and holds the minority position. That order is deliberate. Ownership is the point.
Meet our leadership
Why water
Water is life. Access to it should never depend on someone else.
For generations, our communities have lived under advisories, hauled water, and paid outside companies for water that moves through our own territories. Water carries responsibility, to family, to community, to the generations coming. Sovereign Pure exists so that responsibility comes with authority: safe drinking water our Nations control, from the day it arrives to the decades after.
Decades
of long-term drinking water advisories.
58%
of failures are operational, not missing infrastructure.
THE SHIFT
From extraction to equity.
For generations, the model has been the same: outside companies build, own, and bill; the community pays and waits. Sovereign Pure reverses that arrangement. Ownership sits with the Nation. Revenue stays in the territory. The people running the depot are from the community it serves. This is not a program or a contract — it is a change in who owns the system, and who benefits from it.
TODAY
The community is a customer.
Water arrives as a purchase. The infrastructure, the profit, and the decisions all belong to someone else, and every renewal deepens the dependency.
- Every dollar spent on water leaves the territory and never comes back.
- No local assets, no local jobs, no path to ownership.
- Advisories persist for years while supply contracts quietly renew.
- Decisions about safety, price, and priority are made off-territory.
WITH SOVEREIGN PURE
The Nation is the majority owner.
Water arrives as an asset. The venture, the margin, and the decisions belong to the community, and every year of operation deepens the ownership.
- Every dollar cycles through the territory — wages, dividends, reinvestment.
- Local depot, local jobs, 51% ownership from day one.
- Reliable supply in weeks, with quality certified and reported transparently.
- Decisions about safety, price, and priority are made by the Nation.
Water that comes home
Every route in our network ends in a place like this - a community that owns the depot, the jobs, and the decision.
The three-layer model
Ownership at every layer.
A supply chain and a governance structure, engineered together, so majority Indigenous control exists at every step from source to sip.
Explore the model- 01
Global Supply Backbone
Arctic Freshwater - Icelandic pure glacial water, 10 million liters per week through flexitank logistics.
- 02
National Indigenous Engine
Sovereign Pure - the national engine, Indigenous majority-owned and controlled. Funding, standards, brand, and replication for the whole network.
- 03
Community-Owned JVs
Each Nation holds 51% of its local venture. Local jobs, revenue, control.
What your Nation receives
A working water system, and everything that comes with owning it.
Reliable drinking water in weeks, not construction years
A community depot staffed by your own people
18.9L jugs, bag-in-box, bulk and emergency supply
Training and certification pathways for local operators
Transparent monitoring your council and community can see
51% ownership of the venture, its assets, and its profits
How we work together
Nothing about a community,
without the community.
Co-designed with leadership
Depots, routes, and programs are shaped alongside Council and community, never handed down.
At the Nation's pace
We move when the community is ready. No deadlines imposed from outside the territory.
Community majority ownership
The Nation is the majority owner of its venture, so accountability flows to the people served.
Opt-in, never the reverse
Nations choose to join. Nothing about a community is decided without the community at the table.
For government and funders
A partner that ends the cycle,
not another contract that renews it.
Sovereign Pure gives federal and provincial partners what decades of spending have not: safe water in weeks, community-owned assets instead of recurring invoices, measurable outcomes reported through live monitoring, and delivery aligned with Indigenous ownership and reconciliation commitments. Program funding becomes permanent community infrastructure, community economic opportunities and value.
Talk to us about your mandate