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From http://www.kenoradailyminerandnews.com/News/273958.html
 
Treaty 3 separates from Chiefs of Ontario
By Mike Aiken - Miner and News - Friday December 08, 2006

Grand Council Treaty 3 announced Thursday their decision to withdraw from the Chiefs of Ontario.

A spokesman for the council, Adolphus Cameron, said he was pleased with the council’s decision.

“I’m proud of it. They’ve taken a firm stand on their direction,” he said.

“Some communities may suffer, but ultimately it’s the right choice,” he added.

Cameron noted Grand Council Arnold Gardner has wanted to move in a direction that protects treaty and aboriginal rights, while building relationships that will help rebuild the Ojibway nation.

He said the Chiefs of Ontario had gone too far in becoming an administrative body for the purposes of program funding.

The decision comes as Grassy Narrows First Nation, in the northern part of Treaty 3, celebrates the fourth anniversary of its roadblock at the entry to the Whiskey Jack Forest. Protesters are against clearcutting and the destruction of traditional lands by logging companies, such as Abitibi.

While the Slant Lake site has been peaceful, a total of 21 demonstrators were charged last summer -- mainly with mischief -- in connection with the two blockades. The first halted traffic on the Kenora bypass along the Trans-Canada, while the other stopped logging trucks along the English River Road.

Treaty 3 represents about 17,000 people on 28 First Nation communities in Northwestern Ontario and eastern Manitoba.

The Chiefs of Ontario movement began in 1975, and it became a co-ordinating body for 134 communities within the province.

The Grand Council’s decision had been rumoured for several days, and it was announced the same day as a Special Chiefs Assembly in Ottawa.

In the capital, federal Health Minister Tony Clement and National Chief Phil Fontaine, of the Assembly of First Nations, signed a joint workplan that aims to improve the First Nations health system over the short and long-terms.

NAN Press Release ...

NAN First Nations Recognized During Monumental Speech

Lieutenant Governor of Ontario James K. Bartleman recognized NAN Grand Chief Stan Beardy and the many NAN youth who participated in his Aboriginal Literacy initiative during an unprecedented address to the Ontario Legislature Thursday December 7, 2006.

The Lieutenant Governor's Aboriginal Literacy Initiative was implmented in 2004 to address lower than average literacy rates among First Nation students in Ontario.

There were three phases to this initiative, including book drive, school twinning, and summer camps in communities across NAN.

By engaging a strong partnership network, His Honour James K. Bartleman was able to collect 850,000 useable books to establish and fill libraries in schools throughout NAN territory. He then developed a pen-pal system where NAN schools were twinned with schools in the Greater Toronto Area. Students were able to share resources and cultures, breaking down barriers between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal youth. The third phase was introducing summer literacy camps in many of NAN's 49 communities. These very successful camps included traditional educational components as well as cultural practices.

Mr. Bartleman is the first Lieutenant Governor to be asked to speak to the Ontario Legislature.

For more information on the Lieutenant Governor's Aboriginal Literacy Initiative please visit the following web site:

http://www.lt.gov.on.ca/sections_english/welcome/literacy_main.html

Posted by: Communications and Media jyoung@nan.on.ca.
12/9/2006

From http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2006/12/08/nonprofit-activity.html

Non-profit sector accounts for billions in economy: study
Friday, December 8, 2006 - CBC News

Non-profit organizations in Canada generate billions in economic activity every year, a study by Statistics Canada concluded on Friday.

"Non-profit organizations not only play an important role in the well-being of Canadians, they also constitute an economic force," the agency said.

In an account of non-profit institutions and volunteering, Statistics Canada found that in 2003 the gross domestic product of the non-profit sector amounted to 7.1 per cent of the total economy or $80.3 billion.

The study, which looked at data collected over a seven-year period, found that economic activity by the non-profit sector as measured by GDP outstripped the pace of the overall economy from 1997 to 2003.

It said that GDP for the non-profit sector grew at an average rate of 6.4 per cent every year over the seven years, faster than the average rate of 5.6 per cent for the total economy during that time period.

In 2003 alone, GDP for the overall non-profit sector grew 6.3 per cent, a rate of growth greater than that for the total economy, which rose 5.6 per cent in 2003.

Statistics Canada divided the sector into two groups to analyze the data. The first group includes hospitals, universities and colleges, while the second group, described as the core of the sector, consists of mostly smaller organizations.

The agency said revenue for the core non-profit sector came from a variety of sources, including sales of goods and services, government transfers, membership fees and individual donations.

For hospitals, universities and colleges, however, the main source of revenue was government transfers and sales of goods and services.

"Hospitals, universities and colleges accounted for nearly two-thirds of economic activity in the overall non-profit sector between 1997 and 2003. The generally smaller organizations in the core sector accounted for the remaining third," it said.

Economic activity in the second group or core non-profit sector increased 7.6 per cent between 1997 and 2003, a rate faster than the 5.8 per cent growth for hospitals, universities and colleges. The core's share of the GDP in the sector overall rose 34 per cent in 1997 to 36 per cent in 2003.

The GDP of the core non-profit sector reached $29.1 billion in 2003, representing 2.6 per cent of the total economy. The entire non-profit share rose to 7.1 per cent when the GDP of hospitals, universities and colleges was included in the total.

Non-profits are big business
Statistics Canada reported that the overall non-profit sector generated economic activity greater than that of the mining, oil and gas extraction, and retail industries.

Even the smaller core sector was about twice the size of the agricultural industry and larger than the accommodation and food services industry in Canada.

The analysis also looked at volunteering, concluding that the value of volunteer work was more important than individual donations to the non-profit sector over the seven-year period and that volunteering mainly occurred in the three main fields of culture and recreation, social services and religion.

Of the three main fields, culture and recreation relied more heavily on volunteers than on paid workers, the analysis found.

Related External Links

StatsCan: Account of non-profits and volunteering - http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/061208/d061208a.htm

See the CBC News story after Deputy Chief Alvin Fiddler's document ...

Canada's Blood Diamonds? What DeBeers and the Canadian Governments Are Doing To Aboriginal Communities and the Environment in Canada’s Boreal Forest.

This holiday season, when more diamonds are sold in America than any other time of year, the Hollywood movie “Blood Diamond” is causing many people to reevaluate purchasing ‘conflict diamonds’. They will be looking to buy diamonds from other places in the world where responsible companies are treating local people and the environment fairly and responsibly. And mining companies will be trying to sell them diamonds from Canada.

Unfortunately, many Canadian diamonds are anything but conflict-free; ongoing aboriginal rights and environmental concerns should make consumers think twice before purchasing a Canadian diamond, too.

Nishnawbe Aski Nation, which means the people and the land, represents some 45,000 Cree and Ojibway people scattered over 49 communities in Canada's Boreal Forest—the world’s largest intact ecosystem and Earth’s last line of defense against global warming. At 1.4 billion acres, the Canadian Boreal Forest is one of the largest unspoiled forest ecosystems remaining on Earth, a mosaic of interconnected forest and wetland ecosystems, teeming with birds, fish, plants and animal life. Canada’s Boreal Forest is also a potential treasure chest of timber, oil and gas, and minerals, including diamonds and is under heavy development pressure.

At present, less than ten percent of the Boreal is protected from industrial development. Unless something changes, corporations will carve it up without regard to the impacts to the people or the environment.

While few American’s have ever heard of the Nishnawbe Aski Nation or the Boreal Forest, scientists will tell them what the peoples that live there already know: it’s critical to the earth in so many ways, and must be protected.

The Nishnawbe Aski Nation, along with many other First Nation communities throughout the great Boreal Forest have been in the grip of a diamond exploration boom led by companies like DeBeers.

That and other intensive resource development is causing environmental devastation.

A complicit Canadian government seems to be turning a blind eye.

We need and welcome responsible resource development, but with an emphasis on the word responsible.

The Nishnawbe Aski Nation communities are among the poorest in the world, ranked 69th in the U.N.'s Human Development Index, with the lowest life expectancy in Canada, the highest youth suicide rates in the world, and an unemployment rate of more than 60 percent.

With diamonds on our lands our communities should be wealthy.

Instead the hunt for theses rare gems from the heart of the earth has meant only conflict and strife for us.

De Beers plans to develop massive open pit diamond mining projects in our traditional territory but it is not honoring our treaty rights or working with us to win our consent for the projects.

Their army of airplanes, helicopters and claim stakers have been trespassing on the traditional lands of many of our communities, despite our calls for moratoriums on diamond exploration.

The link between diamond exploration and aboriginal and treaty rights violations fits the pattern of diamond conflicts in Africa. In these former European colonies, the scramble for control of diamond mining territory has helped to fuel a cycle of conflict. Will the cycle be repeated in our lands too?

Before they can claim to have done the right thing in Canada, DeBeers and other Canadian diamond mining companies must demonstrate a different attitude and pattern of behavior. They must allow us to determine where, when and how diamond mining will take place, if at all.

They must also work with us and the Canadian governments to protect the great Boreal Forest ecosystem and make sure it continues to provide clean air, clean water and abundant wildlife for our communities and for the world.

The battle over diamonds will be largely fought in the US, where annual sales of diamond jewelry represent almost half of the $55 billion sold world wide.

The time is now for U.S. consumers to connect the dots and weigh in. Tell De Beers, other diamond miners and Canada that unless things change, Canadian diamonds are no better than conflict diamonds from Africa.

Alvin Fiddler
Deputy Grand Chief Nishnawbe Aski Nation
www.nan.on.ca  

++++++++++++

From http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2006/12/08/conflict-diamond.html

First Nations leader slams Canadian diamonds
Friday, December 8, 2006 - CBC News

A First Nations group in Ontario is trying to dissuade Americans from buying Canadian diamonds this holiday season, saying the jewels are mined at the expense of its people.

Alvin Fiddler, deputy grand chief of the Nishnawbe Aski Nation, said De Beers Canada in particular is causing environmental devastation and disrupting his community of 45,000 Cree and Ojibwa in northern Ontario.

"They're not clean diamonds; they're not conflict-free diamonds," Fiddler told CBC News. "People are paying a price for these diamonds and it's our people in the Nishnawbe Aski Nation. Our people, our children, are languishing in poverty while these resources are being extracted from their territory."

Fiddler this week had an editorial published in the diamond industry trade publication Rapaport News, in which he outlined his concerns about Canadian diamond exploration and mining. He says several communities have called for a moratorium on mineral exploration on land where the legal title is under dispute.

"The battle over diamonds will be largely fought in the United States, where annual sales of diamond jewelry represent almost half of the $55 billion sold worldwide. The time is now for consumers in the United States to connect the dots and weigh in," Fiddler wrote in his editorial.

"Tell De Beers, other diamond miners and Canada that unless things change, Canadian diamonds are no better than conflict diamonds from Africa."

Linda Dorrington, a spokeswoman for De Beers said the company is making an effort to negotiate with First Nations in Canada but said land rights need to be decided by government. The company has one project underway along with exploration work within Nishnawbe Aski territory.

"We encourage the government and these groups to continue to work together to get these matters settled," she said.

Fiddler said the diamond company should stop work until the government settles the land claims.

The trade in diamonds originating in conflict zones, sometimes called "blood diamonds," has helped pay for wars in Africa that have killed millions in Angola, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Congo.

Under heavy criticism from human rights activists, governments, non-governmental organizations and industry enacted the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme in 2002, which tracks diamonds from the mine to the store.

Jewelers are bracing for more consumer scrutiny this season with the opening of the new film Blood Diamond set amid the brutal civil war in Sierra Leone in the late 1990s. Industry officials have launched a high-profile campaign, saying the Kimberley Process has curbed the "blood diamond" trade.

Related Links

• 'Blood diamonds' film sparks debate about illegal diamond trade - http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2006/12/06/conflict-diamonds.html
• Canada's diamond rush - http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/diamonds/
• International agreement reached on trade in 'blood diamonds' - http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2002/03/20/diamonds020320.html
• UN bans sale of Sierra Leone diamonds - http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2000/07/05/diamonds000705.html
• Criticism mounts against 'blood' diamond dealers - http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2000/06/14/diamonds_debeers000614.html
• The Kimberley Process - http://www.kimberleyprocess.com:8080/