Subject: Time Out on Clearcuts
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1999 22:23:29 -0800


First Nations in Canada Need your Help Now!!!

	
'TIME OUT' ON CLEARCUT

"TIME OUT" sums up the approach of the Namgis First Nation to a proposal by

TimberWest Forest Ltd to commence clearcutting on a small but strategic 
island within 'Namgis traditional territory. Hanson Island is located at 
the north end of Johnstone Strait off the northeast coast of Vancouver 
Island.

Recently published research on Hanson Island has revealed it to be a world 
class anthropological resource, and a trove of fascinating evidence 
confirming aboriginal activity from at least as far back as the early 18th 
century.

"It contains irreplaceable cultural resources that must be safeguarded," 
emphasized Lawrence Ambers, administrator for the 'Namgis First Nation. "We

are seeking alternatives to direct confrontation by asking the BC 
government to intervene now, to use its authority to head off the need to 
resort to court action, or to more direct countermeasures on-site if 
clearcutting is allowed to go ahead."

Timing is crucial, since TimberWest's Forest Development Plan for Hanson 
Island is being reviewed by the Ministry of Forest's Port McNeill office, 
and a decision will be made by the end of January.  The band has offered to

send representatives immediately to Victoria to consult directly at the 
ministerial level. Thus far, however, recent letters and phone calls to 
Ministers David Lovick, Aboriginal Affairs, David Zirnhelt, Forestry, and 
Ian Waddell, Small Business, Tourism and Culture, have yet to be answered.

Ambers said that the band's call for a postponement of clearcutting on 
Hanson Island does not discount logging as a key factor in the economy of 
the North Island.  What it does do, however, is acknowledge the need to 
recognize other resources which have until now been adversely affected by 
logging. These include fisheries and tourism as well as cultural legacies.

The 'Namgis Band's statement follows a release issued last week by a group 
of regional eco-tour operators expressing their concerns over how 
clearcutting on Hanson would adversely affect their businesses. These 
include whale watching, kayaking, cultural/historical tours, and 
sightseeing.

The importance of Hanson Island to regional cultural history and to the 
land claims process was given a major boost by the publication of a book by

anthropologist

David Garrick in late 1998. The book, Shaped Cedars and Cedar Shaping, 
chronicled  four years' research on Hanson Island during which Garrick 
located and described some 2,000 Culturally Modified Trees (CMTs), even 
though his work covered only a small fraction of the island.

What Garrick discovered was the intensive way in which aboriginal people 
actively managed their forest resources. By selectively harvesting red 
cedar bark they not only practiced sustainable forestry, they were able to 
increase the yield of bark from any given tree. The level of sophistication

far exceeded what had hitherto been regarded as a rather simple matter of 
bark stripping.

Garrick suggests that individual families or clans probably had tenure over

productive tracts of cedar trees on Hanson Island that endured for many 
generations. Such groves provided a continuing supply of the fibre that was

made into baskets, nets, rope, clothing, mats, and ceremonial gear. Slabs 
of wood, harvested from live, standing trees also provided planking for 
house walls and roofs.

In his book Garrick takes his readers through the absorbing details of how 
the evidence provided by the trees is used to accurately date the times 
when bark was harvested from them, even though those first strips were 
removed hundreds of years before the present. One particularly noteworthy 
CMT bore evidence of a first peel made in 1762. This tree sprouted in 1667 
and yielded its last peel in 1926. In one very ancient relic he may have 
discovered the oldest dateable CMT yet found in North America. Its first 
peel was made somewhere between 1222 and 1284. If the tree was of average 
age for a first peel, around 60, it could have sprouted in 1215, the same 
year that a reluctant King John of England signed the Magna Carta.

Garrick's work has revealed that while many CMTs appear to have been 
overlooked during past logging operations, many more remain only as stumps,

and many were simply knocked down in the rush to haul out more valuable 
logs of other species of trees. It is the vulnerability of this cultural 
treasure, valuable to aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples alike, that 
obliges the 'Namgis to defend what has survived.

"We can't tell how much has already been lost through past clearcutting," 
said Lawrence Ambers. "What is left shows that our ancestors were good 
managers of their natural resources. We must not let them down."

	~~~~~~~ // ~~~~~~~~

For further information you are welcome to contact any of the following 
'Namgis First Nation spokespeople at Ph. (250) 974-5556, Fax (250) 974-5900

or E-mail at : gcspeck-AT-island.net

Bill Cranmer - Chief
Lawrence Ambers - Band Manager
George Speck - Asst. Band Manager






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