About Us
Our central focus is to study and promote approaches to culturally appropriate environmental protection in Wemindji's territory, taking into account the community's commitment to safeguard hunting, fishing and trapping as a way of life, their response to large-scale industrial development, and their consideration of alternative forms of development. Wemindji is a community whose culture and economy depend in significant measure on their connection to lands and waters. Portions of their traditional territory were heavily modified by Hydro-Quebec's James Bay (Phase I) hydro-electric development. The community has also had to adjust, in the last thirty years, to proliferating roads, an influx of recreational hunters and fishers from the south, and the imminent prospect of significant mining activity in their territory.
One of our key goals is to develop the rationale and design for terrestrial and marine protected areas, with special emphasis on the relatively undamaged Paakumshumwaau (Old Factory) watershed. This is an area of striking natural beauty, integral to the Cree hunting way of life, and rich in a diversity of subarctic terrestrial and arctic marine species and habitats. We seek to develop a regime of protection that builds on existing Cree institutions for environmental stewardship, and on Cree practices of indigenous ecological knowledge. Knowledge-sharing, knowledge creation, and cultural and environmental education, in part through innovative use of web-based information systems and communications, are central to our vision for enhanced community control.
Downloads
February
2007
Description: Draft Guidelines for a Research Agreement or Memorandum
of Understanding
File type: Microsoft Word (.doc)