UPDATE NOV 9, 2021: Unfortunately, it is NOT good news in the end: – Crown land considered habitat for endangered moose has been clear cut (audio)
CBC Info AM, Nov 9, 2020 “In Digby County, Crown land between the Silver River and Tobeatic Wilderness areas has been clear cut. That’s despite the Assembly of Nova Scotia Mi’kmaw Chiefs asking the province to halt logging in the area. We hear from Nina Newington, who has been protesting the clearcutting.”
ORIGINAL POST
Good News in our small corner of the world!
Posted on Extinction Rebellion Nova Scotia (Public Facebook Group), circa 8 pm Oct 31, 2021
The cutting has stopped in the Rocky Point Lake area of Digby county where, last year, we blockaded the logging road. All the logging equipment has been pulled out. Not before they decimated some of the most ecologically valuable forest and chopped up more of it with multiple extraction roads, but most of the 638 acres approved for clearcutting has not been touched.
This is definitely good news, even if more crucial moose habitat has been fragmented, but questions remain. The Assembly of Mi’kmaw Chiefs, a year ago, demanded a halt to the logging and asserted their s.35 rights to moose stewardship and consultation. Who decided to ignore their original letter, if that is what happened?
It seems likely that someone was hoping to sneak in and cut down the moose habitat while nobody was looking. Once we shone a light on what was happening and, most importantly, informed the Assembly of Mi’kmaw Chiefs about the cutting under way, somebody, presumably, told Hankinson Logging to stop what they were doing and get their equipment out of there.
Hankinson Logging of Weymouth is the company contracted by WestFor to do the cutting. According to the person who answers their phone, Hankinson works for Freeman Lumber. Freeman Lumber is now managed by the erstwhile general manager of WestFor, Marcus Zwicker. WestFor, a consortium of sawmills, was created by the provincial government to manage crown lands in Southwest Nova Scotia.
Putting a consortium of sawmills in charge of our public lands has turned out to be a terrible idea for the forests and for the people of our area. It is time to end this failed experiment. As we struggle to deal with the twin biodiversity and climate crises, it is clear our forests are worth far more than the fibre that can be extracted from them. Protecting and restoring ecosystem health has to be the priority from now on, “the overarching priority” as the Lahey report calls it.
The wisdom of “two-eyed seeing” and respect for Indigenous rights and culture must guide the shift away from valuing these unceded lands only for the resources that can be extracted from them, never mind the costs to human and non-human kin. Time for a paradigm shift if we want a habitable planet.
Thanks Assembly of Mi’kmaw Chiefs, Thanks XRNS
Related recent posts on NSFN:
Nova Scotia Healthy Forest Coalition calls for Immediate Halt to Logging Operations in Moose Habitat at Rocky Point Lake 29Oct2021
Posted on October 29, 2021
“I am so sorry Forest, I am so sorry Moose… We need to stop this. Now.” – Nina Newington 29Oct2021
Posted on October 29, 2021