- Target:
- Prime Minister of Canada and the Premier of Alberta
- Region:
- Canada
First Nations, Métis and Settler communities in the Lower Athabasca Region of North-eastern Alberta are gravely concerned with the continued rapid pace of the tar sands development in Alberta. There is also an increasing consensus within the international and scientific community that the unregulated tar sands development within the province of Alberta is having: irreversible impacts on biodiversity, the natural environment, alterations in the water quality and quantity, destruction to the fragile pristine Boreal Forest and associated wetlands, aquatic and watershed mismanagement, habitat fragmentation, habitat loss, disruption to the life cycles of endemic wildlife particularly bird and Caribou migration, fish deformities and negative impacts on the human health of the downstream communities.
This is accompanied by the deliberate, blatant, and systematic infringements for Aboriginal & Treaty Rights and Culture.
As a result of this, First Nations, Métis and Treaty Beneficiary communities are joined in solidarity to assert the following:
➢ No new development within the region, until existing and future cumulative impacts to the environment and community health are evaluated and clearly understood. In addition, existing and future impacts to Aboriginal and Treaty Rights must be recognized, understood, assessed and mitigated prior to any new development approvals in the region.
➢ An immediate and thorough independent assessment of the Lower Athabasca Regional Planning, ecosystems health, including air quality and water quality and quantity, biodiversity and the ability of these ecosystems to support existing and future Aboriginal practice and use.
➢ That the independent assessment must be based on Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK), -Traditional Land Use (TLU), and by independently driven western science. The amount and location of areas protected from industrial use and the thresholds for air quality and water quality and quantity is to be based on that combined assessment.
Therefore:
First Nations, Métis and Settler communities insist that until this compound assessment has been completed and recommendations implemented there must be no further new developments (new projects including expansions of old projects) in the Lower Athabasca Region.
We the undersigned are in solidarity with the asks of the First Nations, Metis and settler communities in the Lower Athabasca Region of Northern Alberta.
Existing unregulated tar sands development within the region is already having irreversible impacts on the biodiversity of the environment, the health of the water and aquatic species, the quality of air, and the human health of the downstream communities. Furthermore there have been deliberate, blatant, and systematic infringements for Aboriginal and Treaty Rights and Culture.
The Lower Athabasca Land Use Regional Plan provides an opportunity to right the wrongs in the region and ensure that future development is done sustainably and justly.
Thus we demand that:
Ø No new development within the region, until existing and future cumulative impacts to the environment and community health are evaluated and clearly understood. In addition, existing and future impacts to Aboriginal and Treaty Rights must be recognized, understood, assessed and mitigated prior to any new development approvals in the region.
Ø An immediate and thorough independent assessment of the Lower Athabasca Regional Planning, ecosystems health, including air quality and water quality and quantity, biodiversity andthe ability of these ecosystems to support existing and future Aboriginal practice and use.
Ø That the independent assessment must be based on Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK), -Traditional Land Use (TLU), and by independently driven western science. The amount and location of areas protected from industrial use and the thresholds for air quality and water quality and quantity is to be based on that combined assessment.
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The No New Tar Sands Development - Save the Athabasca petition to Prime Minister of Canada and the Premier of Alberta was written by Lionel_Lepine-ACFN and is in the category Environment at GoPetition.