Check out these lengthy news pieces on Grassy Narrows’ victory in kicking the clear-cut logging corporations off their territory - an area three times the size of Yosemite National Park.
CBC National primetime interview with Roberta Keesick
RAN doesn’t have big campaign victories every day. We are definitely a very talented group of people who work with very talented activists, organizers, ally organizations, and community members every day, and we celebrate our successes when they happen - readers of this blog definitely know this to be true. But a victory as big as AbitibiBowater pulling their logging operations out of Grassy Narrows, which happened just two weeks ago, is big enough to warrant a look back at the huge group of people that poured a tremendous amount of energy into the campaign over the years. Here’s that reflection:
Campaign background
Launched in 1992, the Old Growth Campaign is the oldest campaign at RAN. Our first major victory came in 1999, when it obtained a groundbreaking commitment from Home Depot to phase out the purchase of old-growth wood. Major brands throughout the forest products industry soon followed suit, including companies like Lowe’s, 84 Lumber, Centex, KB Home, and others.
The campaign then moved on to Boise Cascade, another major purchaser of old-growth wood. In 2004, Boise became the first major forest products company to establish a policy against old-growth logging within the United States.
After the Boise Cascade win, the Old Growth Campaign decided to target Seattle-based Weyerhaeuser Corp., the largest lumber company in the world. Weyerhaeuser obtains a significant percentage of its wood from clear-cuts of Canada’s Boreal Forest. More than 10 times the size of California, the Boreal stretches across North America from Alaska to the Atlantic Ocean and forms part of a ring of forest that encircles the entire planet just below the Arctic tundra. It is also the largest terrestrial storehouse of organic carbon – a critical defense against global warming.
Targeting Weyerhaeuser also meant that we could profile the Grassy Narrows First Nation as an example of Weyerhaeuser’s disregard for human rights and environmental protection. The Grassy Narrows community’s traditional territory includes 2,500 square miles of forests, lakes and rivers in northwestern Ontario. The community has struggled against industrial development and destruction of their territory for decades. In 2002, after years of negotiating with the Ontario provincial government and corporations logging on their territory, filing lawsuits to assert sovereignty over their land, and speaking out against the many health, economic, cultural and environmental effects of extractive industry on their land, the youth in Grassy Narrows decided to blockade one of the logging roads on their territory. That blockade is still active today, and stands as the longest running Indigenous logging blockade in Canadian history. The people of Grassy Narrows have stood firm in their demand to determine the future of their land, and in January of 2007 demanded a full moratorium of all industrial activity on their territory. RAN has worked in close partnership with the Grassy Narrows community since 2003, and our relationship with the community has taught all of us at RAN great deal about the importance of taking leadership from communities that are on the front lines of environmental destruction.
On Tuesday, June 3 we got word that AbitibiBowater, the Canadian logging company that is responsible for all of the logging on Grassy Narrows would immediately stop logging on the Grassy Narrows territory because of the conflict with the First Nation community. This was a huge victory for the people of Grassy Narrows, the Old Growth team, and all of the many activists who have taken part in this effort, as our years of hard work targeting Weyerhaeuser, OfficeMax, Grand & Toy and the Ontario government finally means the end of logging in Grassy Narrows – at least for now. We are thrilled and proud to have been a part of the struggle for Indigenous rights for Indigenous people in Canada and the Grassy Narrows First Nation – and we intend to continue to support these struggles in our campaigns in the future.
Campaign strategies
When we decided to target Weyerhaeuser, we wanted to do what RAN does best, pressure Weyerhaeuser in the marketplace. Because Weyerhaeuser is a U.S. based logging company, and most of the wood products from their operations in Canada are destined for the US consumers, we thought that Weyerhaeuser would be a great target for a RAN campaign.
No Weyerhaeuser Grocery Bags!
The Old Growth campaign started out by putting pressure on grocery stores that sold paper bags made by Weyerhaeuser. The campaign was especially strong in southern California where a RAN chapter protested outside of their neighborhood Wild Oats health food stores until they successfully pressured them to stop using Weyerhaeuser bags. Soon after Wild Oats moved away from Weyerhaeuser bags, Trader Joes followed suit.
RAN’s Home-Builder Strategy
Next, the campaign looked to Weyerhaeuser’s home-building subsidiaries in the United States. Weyerhaeuser owns five home-building subsidiaries across the United States, all of which use wood logged in Grassy Narrows in their construction. Activists in Los Angeles, the San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle and Washington D.C. protested in front of new homes and model homes to put pressure on the subsidiaries to stop building American dream homes from a Native nightmare!
The campaign escalated our protests against these home-building subsidiaries, especially Quadrant homes, which is based in the Seattle area, Weyerhaeuser’s home-town. In February 2007, two RAN activists got significant media attention when they climbed on the roof of a Quadrant Home in a Seattle suburb and refused to leave until Weyerhaeuser pulled out of Grassy Narrows. The two were arrested by police with a fire-fighter’s ladder after several hours, just as helicopters from Seattle area television stations arrived – they were live at 5! RAN also targeted Quadrant’s headquarters in Bellevue, Washington in the spring of 2007 the day before Weyerhaeuser’s annual shareholder meeting, by dropping a banner reading “Weyerhaeuser: Human Rights Abuser.”
Organizing in Canada
In the summer of 2006, the Old Growth campaign hosted an incredibly successful summer internship program in Grassy Narrows. Nine interns from North America spent the summer living in Grassy Narrows on the blockade site learning about the culture, and supporting the struggle of the Grassy Narrows First Nation. In July, the interns along with Grassy Narrows community members and activists from Ontario blockaded the Trans-Canada highway in Kenora, Ontario. The action got attention from Canadian press, and was an incredibly bold statement for Indigenous rights in Canada.
During the campaign, RAN coordinated a number of actions in Canada to highlight the importance of Indigenous land rights. Besides the Trans-Canada blockade, we erected a tepee on the lawn in front of the Ontario Legislative building in Toronto reading “Native Rights Now!,” and we organized a march in coalition with the Christian Peacemaker Teams to unfurl a giant yellow arrow pointing toward the Legislative building reading “Native Land Rights Now.” That banner, which we took aerial photos of, has become iconic of the campaign. Most recently, RAN was integral in organizing a week-long camp out in front of the Ontario Legislative building which included representatives from Grassy Narrows, Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (KI), and the Ardoch Algonquin First Nations in Ontario. A coalition of over a dozen environmental, human rights, and faith organizations in Canada also participated.
Targeting Boise, OfficeMax and Grand & Toy
This past winter, the campaign decided to pivot our focus away from Weyerhaeuser for a moment, and to direct attention to Boise Inc., a company that we had targeted just a few years ago. This time we demanded that Boise stop purchasing pulp from Grassy Narrows. Boise is the other major purchaser from AbitibiBowater, other than Weyerhaeuer, of wood products from Grassy Narrows. We decided to target Boise’s retail presence by organizing a day of action against OfficeMax locations in the United States, and Grand & Toy locations in Canada. The day of action was a huge success, with 34 actions taking place all over North America at the end of January 2008. After the success of the day of action, our attention turned to a group of students at Ohio State University in Columbus who were engaged in a long-running campaign to get their campus to purchase sustainable forest products, excluding copy paper from OfficeMax as long as it was made from wood from Grassy Narrows.
At the end of February we had a major victory when Boise announced publicly that they would no longer purchase pulp coming from Grassy Narrows through logging company AbitibiBowater.
Campaign Accomplishments
Over the course of the campaign, Weyerhaeuser made a few significant changes to the way that they do business that are positive, but have gone without much fanfare on our part. Weyerhaeuser is no longer operating in important rainforests in British Columbia, and when they merged their paper division with Domtar, a Canadian logging company that is committed to FSC certification, it meant that forests now logged under Domtar’s management will have to meet more strict forest management practices.
It has been such an honor to work with so many amazing people on this campaign in the two years that I’ve been at RAN. I have been continually amazed by the level of commitment brought to this work by people all over North America, whether they are people who have spent time in Grassy Narrows, long time forest activists, students, donors or people willing to stand in 100 degree heat with a banner because Indigenous rights is an issue that is critically important to all of us. The people of Grassy Narrows have been struggling to protect their culture, their land, and their rights for decades, and AbitibiBowater’s announcement, while significant, is not the end of the work that remains to be done. I hope that we all can look at this campaign and think about how we can continue to support the community in Grassy Narrows, and apply what we have learned to our work in the future.
-Annie
If you’ve been reading this blog, you know by know that RAN’s Old Growth Campaign had a major victory last week when AbitibiBowater, the largest paper company in the world, announced that it would immediately stop logging on the Grassy Narrows First Nation’s traditional territory in Ontario, Canada.
RAN’s Old Growth team, along with the Grassy Narrows community, ally organizations in the United States and Canada, and hundreds of activists, volunteers, organizers and donors all over North America contributed to this milestone victory.
Whether you were out on the streets protesting for Indigenous rights for Grassy Narrows, sending emails to Weyerhaeuser executives, donating to RAN, or following the campaign on www.ran.org, you can call in on Thursday and get the inside story of how we did it! Join us for a conference call on Thursday, June 19, at 5 p.m. PST (8 p.m EST) to discuss the anatomy of this successful campaign.
Conference call information:
Toll Free Dial-In Number (US & Canada): (866) 864-8698
International Dial-In Number: (660) 422-5053
Conference Code: 7989851056 (enter this number when prompted)
If you ever wondered what strategies we used, which tactics were effective and which weren’t, this is a great opportunity to look back on a great win and learn what worked and what didn’t.
RAN staff and activists who played a key role in this victory will participate during the first portion of the call, and we will be sure to leave plenty of time for questions. Please join us!
- Annie
JB Fobister is a Grassy Narrows member who has been a key part of the community’s work towards self-determination. He sends this message:
Six years ago when we blocked the main logging road near our small community people told us we were crazy to take on two of the largest logging companies in the world. We weren’t crazy, we were just fed up with watching our livelihood, our culture, our medicine, our children’s future – our forests - being carried off our land right before our eyes. We were tired after decades of letter writing, petitions, meetings, protests, speaking tours, legal challenges and rallies, but we refused to give up.
Last night, as I was standing in front of my house looking out at Grassy Lake, it occurred to me that the news I had received a day earlier was something huge. Only at that point did it finally sink in that we had forced AbitibiBowater – the world’s largest paper company – to withdraw from our lands.
I’m really thankful for everybody that made this happen. We couldn’t have done it without everybody’s help over all these years.
I met yesterday with Ministry of Natural Resources regional manager Al Wilcox. His tone was entirely different from past meetings. He said “things will be different from now on.” They sure will be. Grassy will not stop until we are in control of our lands and until our territories have been withdrawn from all clear-cut logging. Our moratorium on industry without our consent still stands, and we will enforce it.
I’m very happy today. People need to hear about what we have done. Then people need to stand up and do something for themselves and for the land too. If Grassy can do it, so can you .
JB Fobister
It was a regular day at RAN today, full of meetings and discussions with my ever so talented colleagues. Until about 3pm when David Sone, my fellow Old Growth campaigner, interrupted a meeting that I was in to tell me that AbitibiBowater had just announced that they will pull their logging operations out of Grassy Narrows Territory.
We couldn’t believe what we were reading. A wave of emotion rushed over David and I - AbitibiBowater is the largest paper company in the world, and the company responsible for all of the logging currently happening on Grassy Narrows territory. Weyerhaeuser buys the wood that they use for construction materials from AbitibiBowater, and Boise Inc. announced in February that they would stop buying pulp from AbitibiBowater because it was sourced from the Grassy Narrows territory.
AbitibiBowater’s announcement today means that, when they stop logging, there will be no logging in Grassy Narrows. We can only hope that AbitibiBowater’s announcement will influence ongoing negotiations between the Grassy Narrows community and the Province of Ontario, and allow the community to achieve the moratorium of all industrial activity that they’ve been demanding for the past year.
RAN has worked with the Grassy Narrows community for several years, campaigning for the right of Indigenous people to give their free, prior and informed consent for industrial projects on their territory. This announcement sets the groundbreaking precedent that a relatively small Indigenous community in a remote area of Canada can demand control over what happens on their land - and win.
The current Old Growth campaign team would like to send heartfelt thanks to past Old Growth campaigners, our organizational allies in the United States and Canada, the staff at RAN, and all the wonderful interns, volunteers and organizers who have worked so hard to make this win possible.
-Annie
Weyerhaeuser, by way of its iLevel brand, has been broadcasting the construction of a new house in Reedley, CA live over the Web.
Quick background: In northwestern Ontario’s stretch of boreal forest, Weyerhaeuser owns and operates a major mill which obtains wood from the traditional territory of the Grassy Narrows First Nation. The community has not consented to logging on their territory and has backed a moratorium but lacks the ability to enforce it.
So we sent two our finest out to Weyerhaeuser’s construction site to use a bit of their own technology against them. Annie and Adrian found the site yesterday and deployed a large banner reading “Wake up Weyerhaeuser; American Dream Home, Native Nightmare” directly in front of the company’s auotmated webcam.
Ten minutes later, the image made it to Weyerhaeuser’s site.
But why stop there?
Back at home base, we noticed a great feature of the site, an archive:
But it’s password protected:
Luckily, our folks are a bit smarter than their folks:
Update: better quality video of the event is here.
Update: pictures from the event are here.
This morning, RAN activists gave Weyerhaeuser shareholders an idea of what the company is really about (not the greenwashing lies it posts on its website). About 20 of us descended on the company’s annual shareholder meeting with a 20-foot banner equating the “American Dream” (of big, new homes) with a “Native Nightmare” of flattened forests and eviscerated ecosystems. Three activists locked themselves to the HQ’s front entrance and declared that they wouldn’t leave until Weyerhaeuser got out of Grassy Narrows. Weyerhaeuser had a regular SWAT team of police officers at the ready, and the activists were removed…but not before they ruffled some shareholder feathers by letting them know where–and how–the company gets their quarterly dividends.
(Quick review for those of you not familiar with our battle with Weyerhaeuser: The Grassy Narrows community has been demanding that clear-cut logging stop on their land since 2000, and the Canadian constitution protects their right to preserve their territory for traditional activities such as hunting, which is hard to do when the ecosystem is dead.)
Grassy Narrows also had allies inside the meeting. A handful of RAN sympathizers used the normally polite Q&A period to make Weyerhaeuser execs explain their actions in Grassy Narrows to investors. One woman announced that she had bought Weyerhaeuser stock to support sustainable forestry, but learning about devastation and human rights abuses across the border made her furious. OK, alright: the woman was a plant, but she did call us last night fuming about the blatant lies on Weyerhaeuser’s website.
It was a powerful experience for the activists, and one I’m pretty sure the execs (and security team) won’t forget. One activists is telling me now that I should say a lot of love was felt in the action–and it’s true, it’s love for the planet and for our friends in Grassy Narrows that makes us keep going head to head with a company that is unabashed about its abusive, smarmy business practices.
This afternoon I joined SeaRAG activist Liz and SeaRAG’s newest member, baby Sequoia to deliver nearly 10,000 petitions to Weyerhaeuser’s corporate headquarters in Federal Way, Washington.
The petitions came from RAN members who diligently signed and returned them to RAN over the years, and we thought that it was important for Weyerhaeuser to see how many we’ve collected. Liz, Sequoia and I left the petitions with a Weyerhaeuser representative who assured us that he would deliver them to Weyerhaeuser CEO Steve Rogel.
We’ve been pressuring Weyerhaeuser to stop purchasing wood from the Grassy Narrows First Nation’s traditional territory for years now, and they still haven’t gotten the message - hopefully these petitions will help.
Thank you to everyone who signed one of these petitions to Weyerhaeuser!!!!
-Annie
Last week women from Grassy went out to the edges of their land, near where some cutting of the forest is still taking place. One of the women sent out this statement:
We will go there to feel a little bit of the suffering the land is feeling. We will go there to feel the life of our traditional laws which still roam strong amongst the animals, land, trees, water and spirits. Our laws still exist we just have to bring life to them by exerting them, by living them not just talking about them. They are being undermined by foreign laws and system of government and we are allowing this.
I feel I am trying to bring life to our laws but I am being charged right now by foreign and alien laws for building cabins. I am determined to continue so much so that this past weekend (and as often as I can) I took my six year old granddaughter Ashenokwa out there by snow mobile. What I’m doing is for her, my sons, future generations… We should be out there without fear, without being disturbed, without anyone stopping us for being who we are.
I am finding it hard to fight in their courts because it’s all to do with having money. I am not able to find this money. I cannot take money from my people too.
We will eventually head out soon. We will go there to pray for our relatives that are suffering, our kids that are being abused with alcohol and drugs, we will pray that our people remain strong and not fall prey to little deals, we will pray for strength, we will pray for unity, for health….
There’s few details available, but it sounds like action may be brewing in Grassy Narrows.
The message below was forwarded along with this eviction notice late last night from Judy Da Silva, a clan mother and one of many women leading the grassroots effort to end clearcut logging there.
These 4 women are out there right now as we speak, handing this notice to the people devastating the land and forest of the Anishinabe people. Send positive thoughts out their way to protect them from danger. They are at least 4 hours from Asubpeeschoseewagong Village (Grassy Narrows Indian Reserve). They are in the north end of our traditional territory.
Gitchi Meegwetch
Those following the story in Grassy Narrows know that the community began high-level negotiations with the Province of Ontario last month. The talks are aimed at establishing a moratorium on industrial development within the community’s traditional territory.
The eviction issued yesterday is similar to a notice issued to loggers in December 2005 just prior to the last major escalation of protests and blockades initiated by the community.
RAN staff and representatives from a host of organizations working in solidarity with Grassy Narrows are meeting with leadership in the community today to coordinate support for the community through the Spring.
Check back to this post and FreeGrassy.org for for more information as it becomes available.