Environment committee  The question was about strategic economic considerations. I would say this would affect all the natural resource development sectors. I think there is a tremendous opportunity there for first nations if they can get the right land use and priority plans in place. They will engage

Environment committee  Yes, I would wholeheartedly support that. You can't conserve and develop without taking into consideration one or the other. First nations people should be at the heart of that discussion.

Environment committee  The White Feather forest initiative comes out of northwestern Ontario, centred roughly around the Pikangikum First Nation's traditional territory, and then it flows further west into the eastern side of the lakes in Manitoba. There's a consortium of either six or seven first na

Environment committee  Resources, people who do it, and a longer-term timeframe because the youth have been subjected to an intergenerational traumatic experience. So turning that around and connecting it back to the land base is going to take some time. It can't just be a one-year or a two-year thing.

Environment committee  Specific technical work on the national conservation plan has not really happened yet. We've heard about it before, leading up to the throne speech. It was in the throne speech, and here we are now at the environment and sustainability committee to talk about it. The land base is

Environment committee  I think there is going to have to be a meeting of the minds on the legal parameters around free, prior, and informed consent, and I trust there will be. I think there is some goodwill on all sides of the table. People want to see things done a little more proactively on the land

Environment committee  The one main program that comes to mind would be the Urban Multipurpose Aboriginal Youth Centres initiative, UMAYC. I sat on one of the adjudication committees in Alberta for this. It was managed out of the Department of Canadian Heritage. As a youth board we would give advice on

Environment committee  Yes and no. I think the general intent and the general working dynamic Monte shared with us is generally correct. The legality that comes into international conventions and treaties, the establishment of free prior informed consent, and consent within the Convention on Biological

Environment committee  I checked up as far as I could because our shop is a small technical shop here in Ottawa, but we were monitoring the fact that Canada was going to ratify and sign the convention on biological diversity. There are articles underneath the convention that are internationally binding

Environment committee  Again—

Environment committee  Please design a resource and a technical package that can look into paragraphs (a) and (j) of article 8 as they apply to the national conservation program.

Environment committee  Boy oh boy, that's a huge topic. It's not a really well-known portion of history that a lot of Canadians are in regular contact with. I happen to be lucky in the sense that I have done some advanced graduate work and have lived, worked, played, and prayed—done everything—in the m

Environment committee  I was just taking notes on my colleague's answers here. It's just a cordial thing to do.

Environment committee  Well, 80% of first nations communities are in the forest, and we would hope, because of our organization being the National Aboriginal Forestry Association, that there would be a discrete envelope of support for that sector. Given all the connections between prosperity, anti-pove

Environment committee  Let's talk about an envelope for the aboriginal forest sector. Let's discuss that and let's move that forward. It is important for first nations aboriginal communities to be prosperous in the rural hinterland of Canada and be contributing to the lifeblood of the country, as oppos