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Calls for preservation of country and a halt to Rio Tinto's proposed Hope Downs Iron Ore mine
A day before their London based Annual General Meeting, Senior Elder of the traditional owners of the country impacted by the Hope Downs mine site has requested Rio Tinto to halt operations and reconsider its proposed mining activities on site. Slim Parker urged the company: "In light of what they have done in the past destroying important sites in the area, they have the opportunity to make amends - they have the capacity today to make the decision not to mine this area at all. Our wish is to protect the scientific, historical cultural and spiritual heritage values of the area, and that they be preserved so everyone can share the significance. I have always maintained that this area should not be mined at all, that it should be preserved. Rio Tinto should halt their operations. The traditional owners, the Fortescue Martidja Banyjima people and the Nyarparli people are united in our desire to preserve this area. "
Results of testing of some of the sensitive sites for which protection is sought has had archaeologists identifying the site as one of the most significant archeological finds in Australia, with initial discovery of artefacts dating back at least 35,000 and further investigations scheduled.
“This is a litmus test for the value of Rio Tinto's commitments to the environment and to indigenous people. Their own policies require them to respect the wishes of the traditional owners of the area and minimise their impact on the environment. If they won't meet their own standards here in Australia where they are subject to scrutiny, then we have a dismal indication of what they are doing everywhere else in the world” stated Techa Beaumont, Executive Director of the Mineral Policy Institute.
The Mineral Policy Institute is supporting the efforts to protect the area and calling on Rio Tinto for:
- An immediate and ongoing halting of any ground work on site to ensure the stringent protection of all potential sites of significance in the area. This including a guarantee to the senior custodians and other Aboriginal traditional owners that their express wishes that certain sites -including some of the most significant archeological discoveries ever found in Australia and areas of cultural importance and that mining does not take place on any sites without free and prior informed consent of traditional owners responsible for the country
- A commission and make public an independent study on the options for re-injection of freshwater into the aquifers in the region from mine dewatering that will avoid freshwater depletion, ecosystem and cultural heritage destruction and address the serious cumulative impacts of water from mining in the region
"The government of Western Australia has failed to take measures to adequately protect these important cutural sites and natural values. The government should be undertaking strategic regional reviews of cumulative impacts of mining in regions such as the Pilbara. Numerous significant mines in this area are all in the perched aquifer system posing huge cumulative threats to the Fortescue system (change from event focused to perennial river system) and huge expansions to the current activities are on the cards." stated Ms Beaumont
FURTHER DETAILS
YouTube Stories:
Weeli Wolli Creek Australia
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPBhVTDs2X8&NR=1
Niyayaparli People's Story
PART I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTaJpUAq0dU&feature=related
PART II
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNAjf1aREJg&feature=related
PART III
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqU1e6BOPOo&feature=related
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Traditional owners, environmental and heritage experts have a number of concerns over the proposed operation:
CULTURAL HERITAGE SIGNIFICANCE
Senior Elder Slim Parker reiterated the spiritual significance of the area for his people: "The archaeological finds are in accordance with the dreamtime stories and songs and customs and beliefs that we have and what we practice today. It is what we talk about in terms of spiritual beliefs of mother earth as our provider, as our mother it provides for us, and in accordance with our customs and beliefs this is of real cultural significance. It is what we call in our law, Jibalba. It is a ritual place where ceremonies are performed to allow the totem there to provide the honey for us, that whole area is significant, not just the finds - the whole valley is important to us."
In other operations in particular the Rio Tinto owned Marandoo project, which was gazetted out of national park to pave the way for mining, the company drilled through and destroyed other rock shelters before there could be proper investigations, disturbing the site and making it unsafe for the archaeologists to work there. The true significance of what is destroyed in these other areas will now never be known.
Rio Tinto's policies state that it "recognises and respects the significance of the cultural heritage of Indigenous people who have traditional ownership of, or historical connections to, the land on which Rio Tinto businesses operate"
IMPACTS ON WEELI WOLLI CREEK
Rio Tinto's Iron Ore (RTIO) operations at Hope Downs are proposing to discharge 110ML per day (40.15 GL a year) of potable water from its mine dewatering processes into the Weeli Wolli Creek in the Pilbara for the life of mine of 15-20 years. It will further impact cultural heritage sites and natural vegetation, and is depleting groundwater resources, which have accumulated over thousands of years. Much of this water will be lost through evaporation.
Rio Tinto's David Richards has publicly stated, "New mining projects, particularly those in areas already suffering water stress, should be designed to be at worst, neutral in their effect on water resources." (per David Richard, Rio Tinto p6, Business Perspectives on the Findings of the MA (2006)
Rio Tinto has failed to adequately investigation or develop techniques to implement the best available technology at Weeli Wolli that would have progressively recharged the watertable rather than depleting it are impacting an already stressed water system and a broader bioregion. Their approach has caused distress to the traditional owners of the region, where a number of cultural heritage sites are located in and along the river are impacted by existing dewatering and further threatened by the Hope Downs proposal.
The potable water that is proposed to be dumped down the creek is an important resource available for future use that will, according to current understandings may take thousands of years to recharge.
The cumulative impact of dewatering by iron ore projects in the region is likely to have massive regional impacts that extend to downstream environments and long term impacts on the whole Fortescue catchment. According to MPIs Robin Chapple who has monitored the developments in the region for decades, arrangements to recharge the aquifer rather than discharge the water in a delicate creek system were outlined by the corporation as the approach that would be taken by previous operators of the Hope Downs iron ore project to the government for the mine's development. The company can minimise its impact both its short and long term impacts on water resource and associated ecosystems as well as avoid impacts on important cultural heritage sites of concern to the areas traditional owners if it implements the proposal of the original owners.
ARCHAEOLOGICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF CULTURAL SITES
Ancient tools found in a prehistoric dwelling place on the Hope Downs site have been confirmed as one of the most significant archaeological finds in Australia. The find in archaeological terms is globally significant, with the tools dated as 35,000 years old, being compared by scientists to the finds in Lake Mungo in NSW, which warranted the inclusion of the cultural values of the area in a World Heritage nomination. Dr Draper, who has been involved in recent investigations of the sites explained to the Western Australian newspaper: "The cave is a rock shelter measuring 10 by eight metres, with a roof 1.5 metres high. The 1.5-metre excavation pit goes down 2.2 metres to the bedrock below, and there is evidence of Aboriginal occupation down to two metres deep, he said. The tools, along with seeds, bark and other plant material, were found nearly 6 1/2 feet beneath the floor of the shelter _ a slight crevice in the hillside protected by an overhang of rock _ on the edges of an iron ore mine site about 590 miles northeast of Perth, the capital of Western Australia. Twelve other sites in the area have also yielded archaeological evidence such as stone tools, fireplaces and dateable charcoal as well as plant remains such as seeds and bark. Another 20 have still to be excavated. Further sealed off caves are thought to be ancient burial tombs and are yet to be investigated." There is the possibility that once excavation work is carried out that materials could be even older and that sites not yet investigated could hold even more significant finds.
Quoted in the Age newspaper Slim Parker, a senior elder of the Fortescue Martidja Banyjima people said, "We have always known this is an important part of our history, that our ancestors live here. Our stories and songs tell us this. It is a good feeling to know archaeologists have proved what we say is true. It makes us feel strong. Now we want this place preserved. It is part of our heritage and our culture. This area of land, in regard to our culture and customs and beliefs, is of great significance to us," Parker said. "We have songs and stories relating to that area as a sustaining resource that has provided for and cared for our people for thousands of years." An archeological study shows Mr. Parker's ancestors lived in the area for more than 1000 generations.
Melbourne University's Professor Jim Bowler, who discovered bones on the shores of Lake Mungo in the late 1960s — later estimated to be 40,000 years old, making them the oldest human remains found in Australia — said: "This appears to be a very, very important find. It seems likely to write a new chapter in the history of Aboriginal Australia."
Since these artifacts refitted together, it showed that the site had not been previously disturbed. "We now hope Rio will redesign the mine to protect this site, so that we can begin a major salvage operation," said Dr Draper, the consultant who headed the team investigating the sites. It is reported that discussions are now under way between the company and the traditional owners, who want the sensitive areas protected from mining.
Rio Tinto, which had been expanding its Hope Downs mine, halted all work when the rock shelter was discovered and will amend its expansion plans to preserve the shelter company spokesman Gervase Greene was reported as saying (http://www.townhall.com/news/world/2008/04/07/ancient_tools_unearthed_in_australia?page=1)
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Information based on reports by Jan Maymen in the Western Australian, April 7 2008
Interviews with Slim Parket, and online news sources referenced in text
For more information, please contact:
Techa Beaumont
Workphone: +61 2 9557 9019
Mobile: +61 409 318 406
Created: 16 Apr 2008 | Last updated: 16 Apr 2008
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