Indigenous Peoples and Mining: Maori and Schedule 4 Land.

Amongst the recent debates here in NZ we see the merest hint of the ‘paradox of ethical poverty’ through the simmering engagement of Maori complicity in mining. (By the paradox of ethical poverty I mean the romanticised racism of poor Natives somehow being happy Natives, in their natural state, at one with nature et cetera, et cetera). As I noted in one of those regular rants on Facebook, we are complicit in the operations of the mining sector. Take your average mobile phone for instance. In an article on the Congo mining sector, John Prendergast and Sasha Lezhnev highlight the supply chain of the 3Ts - tin, tantalum, and tungsten – important minerals in the ever burgeoning mobile phone and personal computer market. In perhaps the most shocking example, the Congo mines are manned by underpaid workers, including children, and the issues are the same as those raised by the morality of so-called blood or conflict diamonds.

15 year-old Congo boy mining. (He started aged 8.)

My point is that mining is integral to the contemporary economy. Your bog-standard computer contains aluminum, antimony, arsenic, barium, beryllium, cadmium, chromium, cobalt, copper, gallium, gold, iron, lead, manganese, mercury, palladium, platinum, selenium, silver, and zinc. Stuff which ain't growing on trees. (Which is not to say that heavy metals can't be harvested... check out Dr. Amanda Blacks just completed thesis on bioavailability). Advances in energy technologies will require a range of minerals, often sourced from the rural areas of developing countries. Electric cars with lithium batteries? Step up Bolivia. Of course Australia has mined all over aboriginal land, and serious concerns exist for other areas.



The justification of mining Schedule 4 land in Aotearoa/NZ is that we're basically broke as a nation and have to draw more on our natural resources to catch up to Australia, hardly the best performing OECD economy, given its perverse reliance on mining), but the point is taken: the poorer we are (relative to those we compare ourselves to), the fewer our collective options.

What then for Maori? After all, are we not poorer than Pakeha as a group? Do we not also own (or are about to own) large tracts of land which, as was mentioned last year when the audit of DoC land was announced, just may hold considerable mineral wealth? Its certainly on the table in the Coromandel, where Ngati Rehua have already fingered the government for bad faith bargaining.

This debate sits alongside the wider debate on ownership and utilisation of Aotearoa/NZ resources. We're upset at Chinese ownership? Well, so are others. China is the single biggest investor in Africa, and the role of China, Taiwan and Japan as aid donors is challenging NZ's 'backyard' for influence. I do not necessarily oppose this role - god knows we've treated our Pacific neighbours like shit - but the Chinese buy votes for their purposes, which may not match sustainable Pacific futures, and may not match ours...



Yet again we are faced with a debate on what we find acceptable in our way forward. (Perhaps that is the wrong analogy, too spatial. We're 'onward' in the temporal sense....time passing regardless of our physical location). And NZ as a society hasn't been especially good at that since, well, not in my adult life. First let's get some numbers together - quantities help establish qualities - then lets put out some more maps, this time including transport links, processing facilities and so on. Then lets get some talking heads in the media and start thrashing it out. They lead the debate n the RSA's, working mens' clubs, hairdressers, and bus shelters. It started with a hiss and a roar but has since faded away (okay, perhaps drowned by all the other issues, not least being Canterbury water...on which let me mihi to my old friend Dave 'Sudsy' Sutherland who spoke with real emotion over the future of this province and its water). Are we destined set camp at the crossroads, talking with the devil about what we can trade for our pleasure?




Other reading:

Here's the oroginal government discussion paper: 'Maximising our Mineral Potential:
Stocktake of Schedule 4 of the Crown Minerals Act and beyond'.

Howlett, Catherine. "Flogging a Dead Horse? Neo Marxism and Indigenous Mining Negotiations" Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, Marriott Wardman Park, Omni Shoreham, Washington Hilton, Washington, DC, Sep 01, 2005 . 2009-05-25 (Although lordy lordy, they signed the UN Declaration of Indigenous Rights...)

History of Mining in the Pacific, by Dr. Allen L. Clark, Senior Fellow, East-West Center, Honolulu, Hawaii.

Dr. Katerina Teawi, a visiting scholar at the MacMillan Brown Pacific Studies department a few years back, explored some fascinating issues with the extraction of phosphate on Banaba in her research 'Our sea of phosphate: The diaspora of Ocean Island'.

Check out this 'Mining Information Kit for Aboriginal Communities'

Salmon apology: Winnemem Wintu on the Rakaia!

Great to see representatives of the Winnemem Wintu tribe of Northern California have arrived in Aotearoa/New Zealand to reconcile various dynamics concerning the great Chinook salmon, introduced game fish of the east coast rivers of the South Island. I've been fishing the Rakaia since I was a wee kiddie, mainly for herrings and kahawai down at the south side of the mouth, and sometimes eels in the nooks and eddies.

I was lucky enough to witness the Calling Back the Salmon ceremony last year on the banks of the Yuba River, courtesy of UC Davis ecologist Josh Viers...










Josh Viers

The Rakaia environs are quite sparse, very bleak on a southerly day but a great place for communing with Mother Nature...


I also enjoyed conversations with Bill Jacobson of the Social Alliance Network


News leads here in Aotearoa on the Winnemem Wintu: TV 3

Is there an Indigenous response to financial crises?: The evolution of Māori Cultural Political Economies

Just returned from the Asia-Pacific Economic and Business History Conference, Pipitea Campus of Victoria University. I delivered a paper on Is there an Indigenous response to financial crises?: The evolution of Māori Cultural Political Economies. Essentially I see a convergence between Maori Cultural Political Economies and non-Maori/Pakeha CPEs as we now adminster more and more of our assets through a capitalist lens (which speaks of the resilience of a mode of production we as Indigenous peoples, among others, have long been critical of).


Some interesting data was presented by Evan Roberts of Victoria University on Maori height as a proxy for economic well-being. "Tall active, and well-made" Stature of the New Zealand Maori population c.1700 - 1976. I'll incorporate Evan and his associates data and analyses into my paper as I tool it up for publication.



Managed to get an hour in Archives before my flight outta town, some wonderful records of Maori farming and farmers through their engagement in Te Ahuwhenua, the 'Maori Farmer of the Year' trophy, awarded annually (with a few gaps) since 1932. This will be the subject of my next conference attendance, the massive Native American and Indigenous Studies Association conference in Tucson, Arizona, May 20-22.

Kainga Whenua

Interesting policy by which Maori can return to their land, put in place some new housing and hopefully improve their living conditions. Essentially requiring a three-way agreement between borrowers, land owners (who one presumes are whanau) and Housing New Zealand.

Perhaps this will be a topic for debate at the upcoming Maori Housing Conference. Certainly we need to move on the whole issue of Maori housing, with concerns for, among other things, overcrowding, uninsulated homes, and the security of electricity supply (especially for isolated communities). Since 1991 the proportion of Māori who own their own home has fallen from 61% to 45%. While some of this may be due to a quite rational decision to rent, given the Kiwi savings approach of paying off your house, this stat puts Maori in a very poor position for the future (oh, unless of course we're all squirreling away a good amount of our income into secure diversified investments...)

Iwi are starting to take this on this issue. Ngati Awa, for instance, are leasing six of their own houses to Housing NZ for specific whanau. (Incidentally I've heard Ngati Awa are exploring the possibility of using innovative, locally-sourced, building materials based on pumice...).

Of course they've YouTubed this announcement...

On a last note, I'm impressed by Kiwibanks proactive 'for NZ' stance on a number of issues (not least their consistently lower interest rates).

Maori Unemployment up, up, and away...

Well well well, three holes in the ground.

After all that lovely fluffy talk about the recession being over we have that most beastly of things: a jobless recovery! Maori unemployment at 15.4%, and in the words of the NZ Herald (whose online edition is rubbish in my opinion...), the unemployment rate for "the European ethnic group" is 4.6%. Pakeha should be proud of being Pakeha! And like we know, they're unlikley to be unemployed with all the stigma and poverty that involves...

Here's a good article dealing with the issue...

Of even more interest, check out these New Zealand income figures.
They show the median income is just $23,000! For wage and salary earners, it is $38,000. Jeez wayne....