MINING IMPACTS ON INDIGENOUS PEOPLE - THE NEED FOR GLOBAL EXTRACTION STANDARDS

The Native American citizens organization Doodá (NO!) Desert Rock [DDR] focuses on land and environmental issues and acts as a spearhead for establishing international standards for extractive industries. In the American Southwest, DDR embodies the spirit of resistance and action to prevent construction of the Desert Rock Energy Project, a 1,500 megawatt power plant that will burn Navajo coal stripped from sacred lands in Arizona and New Mexico.The presenter will give her experience as a grassroots community organizer working on the Navajo Reservation and explain what it means to tribal members to be surrounded by severe mining in everyday life. Particular issues are a) pressures on native youth to work for multinational energy development companies on the reservation, and b) negative impacts of mining on the land and water that Traditional People need for cultural survival. Speaking from the past and to the future, she will argue that students, teachers, scientists, engineers and rank-and-file workers need to keep human rights in mind as they go about their business of mining the world.