by Catherine Delahunty
This morning a homeless orang-utan from the tropical rainforest was seen busking with friends from the Green Party in Wellington Railway Station. The commuters responded enthusiastically to the moving renditions of “In the jungle the mighty jungle the chainsaws roar tonight,” “Stand by Me,” and “Don’t Fence Me In.”
They say never perform with children and animals but since this issue is about both I was happy to sing along and hand out information about my Member’s Bill that would prohibit the import of illegal and unsustainable tropical timber products. We had a very receptive audience some of whom tried to give us money but we were asking instead that they send an e card to John Key about supporting the Bill.
There is one week to go before the Bill is debated for First Reading in the House. We have visited retailers who have stepped up to good wood certification and retailers who are dragging the chain. I have spoken at community meetings in many parts of the country. We toured with West Papuan activist Paula Makabory who helped the campaign. We have lobbied all political parties and we have received amazing support from the coalitions of wood industry and environment groups and from the groups that represent responsible importers of tropical timber. Greenpeace agrees that the Bill would be a great step forward and has called on people to support it.
All we need now is more ecards to John Key this week! Let’s do it for the planet, the 60 million indigenous people potentially affected, the numerous endangered species, and for the ultimate bottom line: the climate!
Published in Environment & Resource Management | Parliament by Catherine Delahunty on Wed, October 14th, 2009
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on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
Did you know that they live at the edge of Villages in Java?
Quite tame -as the locals consider them ‘people’
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Keith Locke should wear the same suit in the parliment debating chambers.
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Hirsute, her suit.
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This is a critical issue for us, the severely affected environment, & the issue of a fairer world, let alone the ‘criminal’ intent of those guilty ones & it’s wide & spreading influence on our climate (undisputed by any sane person I believe). Please support it by any means possible and legal.
Congratulations Katherine & the quite convincing homeless ape !
An interesting fact about the ‘tame’ animals.
My memory of a visit to the island of Borneo in the 70’s is shocking when viewing the same landscape now on Google earth. I have tears in my eyes now just thinking about it !
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Perhaps I should have written ‘unconvincing’ but what the heck !
this is worth a view.
http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/news/animals-news/fer nan-vaz-gorillas-vin.html
-as the problem applies to all great apes worldwide in areas of conflict & rain-forest distruction where the apes are still hanging on despite the best efforts of man to destroy them. Where is this not happening ?
As noted previously my view is to consider the ‘total environment’ & not just those factors seemingly connected to C Change. Although of course a connection can usually be found, but it is hardly sensible to ignore C Change because one ‘does not believe in it’and then be tolerant of living in a future ‘Sh** Heap even if the atmosphere was pristine – hardly likely anyway of course.
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