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Welcome to the fourth issue!  This week's issue is short due to time 
constraints.  Stay tuned for more news next week.

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In this issue:	Conservation Working Group Meeting
                Shell Nomination for Environmental Award Questioned
		Updated Excomm List

We always need volunteers! Contact any excomm member for more info.

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CONSERVATION WORKING GROUP MEETING

Wednesday 14 May, 7 pm, 2099 Gottingen Street (Oxfam office).  For more 
information, contact the Conservation co-chairs: Nadia, 425-5119 or Cass 


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SHELL GAME FOR ENVIRO NOMINATION	Press Release from Lower Mainland
by Charlie Smith			Group, Sierra Club
 
	The World Wildlife Fund has upset some local environmental
activists by nominating Shell Canada Ltd. and three other oil companies
for a B. C. Minister's Environmental Award. The annual awards are
presented during Environment Week, which occurs this year from June 1 to
June 7. 
	WWF B. C. coordinator Sabine Jessen told the Georgia Straight that
she and Calgary WWF coordinator Dawn Mitchell nominated Shell Canada,
Chevron Canada Resources, Petro-Canada, and Mobil Oil Canada because they
agreed last month to donate about 130,000 hectares of exploration rights
to the Nature Consevancy of Canada to create a marine reserve off the east
coast of South Moresby Island (Gwaii Haanas) in the Queen Charlotte
Islands. "We have to recognize when the corporate sector does a good
thing," Jessen said. 
	But one of last year's award winners, Geraldine Irby, told the
Straight that it was "inappropriate" for the WWF to nominate the oil
companies - and particularly Shell - because of its international parent
company's controversial activities in Nigeria. 
	"I intend to write a letter to the province," said Irby, who has
produced the Sierra Club of Western Canada newsletter for 22 years. "I'll
tell them I will seriously consider sending my award back if Shell is
given this award, because I feel it makes a mockery of the whole process. 
	Sid Tan and Jaggi Singh, two spokespeople for the Ogoni
Solidarity Network, also criticized WWF for nominating Shell Canada for an
environmental award. Tan told the Straight that Shell International has
taken $30 billion worth of oil out of Nigeria since 1958 and caused massive
environmental problems in poverty-stricken Ogoni communities in that
country. 
	The WWF's President Emeritus, Prince Phillip, attended the signing
ceremony in Calgary, where the oil companies donated their exploration
rights. In a news release following the ceremony, WWF Canada president
Monte Hummel and Nature Conservancy of Canada chair Robert Carswell
lavished praise on the oil companies. 
	"It supports WWF's Living Planet Campaign which is meant to ensure
protection for the global web of life in the years to come,"  Hummel said
in the release. 
	Shell public-affairs manager Jan Rowley told the Straight that
Shell Canada doesn't do business in Nigeria. She said that Shell Canada,
which generated a $595-million profit in 1996 on revenues of $5.2 billion,
is a publicly traded company, with 78 percent of the share held by Shell
Transport and Trading and Royal Dutch Shell. Royal Dutch Shell's
subsidiary in Nigeria left Ogoniland in 1993 following widespread citizen
unrest. 
	Ogoni writer and environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight
other activists were hanged on November 10, 1995, after criticizing the
Nigerian dictatorship and Shell Oil. Nine days later, the U. S. Sierra
Club board of directors voted in favour of a consumer boycott of Shell Oil
until the company cleaned up its mess in Nigeria and paid compensation. 
	"The World Wide Fund for Nature has calculated that Shell's
gas-flaring activities in Nigeria are a major contributor to global
warming," the Sierra Club claimed in an article on it's Web site. 
"According to Saro-Wiwa, the gas-flaring, sometimes in the middle of
villages, has destroyed the wildlife, plant life, poisoned the air and
water, and left residents half-deaf and prone to respiratory diseases." 
	Transparency International has named Nigeria the most corrupt 
country in the world. Shell discovered oil in the Niger River delta more 
than 40 years ago and today, according to the New York Times, it is 
responsible for more than 40 percent of the Nigerian dictatorship's revenue. 

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CHEBUCTO GROUP EXCOMM

Chair (away  	Paul Falvo	492-1995	pfalvo@chebucto.ns.ca
  until July)

Vice (Acting)	Nadia Stuewer 	425-5119	n_Stuewe@bass.stmarys.ca
  Chair

Conservation	Nadia Stuewer	425-5119	n_Stuewe@bass.stmarys.ca
		Cass Elliott	455-3852	au361@chebucto.ns.ca

Outings 	Henrietta Mann	496-8235	HMANN@shark.stmarys.ca

Programme 	Jack Devenney	463-0090
		Henrietta Mann	496-8235	HMANN@shark.stmarys.ca

Youth 		Arciris Garay	443-8472	af169@chebucto.ns.ca

Membership 	Allison Denning	425-1379	adenning@is2.dal.ca
		Derek Fenton	423-6486 Habitat2%HX1FHM%DFOSF@maritimes.dfo.ca

Secretary	Allison Denning 425-1379	adenning@is2.dal.ca

Publicity	Heather Breeze  429-5094        aa670@chebucto.ns.ca
		Jeff Johnston			optimal@istar.ca

Treasurer	Jack Devenney	463-0090

Fund Raising	vacant

Web Master	Ben Tremblay 	423-8682	ab006@chebucto.ns.ca

Visit us on the 'Net!
http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/Environment/Sierra/

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