*Development of the Oil deposits at the Sakhalin shelf has started*
*WHAT DO THE NIVKHA THINK ABOUT IT*?
Around the island of Sakhalin an intensive development of the Natural Gas
and Oil deposits has been started. Mind blowing profits are expected by
all the partners of "Sakhalin-1" and "Sakhalin-2". 2/3 of the taxes will
stay in the Russian Far Eastern Region. By the year 2005 natural gas from
Sakhalin will cover 84% of the consumption of Sakhalin, Khabarovsk and
Primorsky regions. This is impressive! This is great!
*But a couple of questions come to mind.*
On the shores of the Oil and Gas producing shelves traditionally live
Nivkhs - the Indigenous inhabitants of Sakhalin island. By now they are
numbered 4000 people. Their main traditional life sustaining activities
are sea hunting and fishing. They have been doing this for thousands of
years precisely in those waters where the Oil and Gas will be produced.
Article 7, paragraph 3 of the Federal law "Agreement on product sharing"
(signed by the President of the R.F. on December 30, 1995, Decree # 225-
F3) states:" If an agreement is made over economic activities on
territories of traditional habitat and activities of the smallnumbered
ethnic populations, the investor must take all the necessary steps to
protect the traditional environment and the way of life of these
populations". This is also in compliance with the Article 72, paragraph
1"m" of the Constitution of the R.F. , according to which protection of
the traditional environment and the way of life is under the joint
jurisdiction of the Federal and regional authorities of the R.F.
To prevent a possible dispute on the terminology, I would like to point
out that in this particular case under the "smallnumbered ethnic
populations" we must understand smallnumbered Indigenous peoples. The
latter is also the Constitutional term.
Question #1 is how fully are represented interests of Nivkha, as
Indigenous people of the region, in protection of their traditional
environment and way of life in "Sakhalin-1" and "Sakhalin-2"?
Question #2: How are the economic interests of the Nivkha protected? Is
there a direct profit share participation for them? Are they a partner in
these projects?
Question #3: Is there a written guarantee by the partners of a
compensation in case of an environmental damage to the shores and waters?
All these questions are reasonable because with Oil and Gas productions
the traditional hunting and fishing grounds of Nivkh are greatly reduced.
These questions are vitally important to Nivkh because of the drastic
reduction of fish and sea mammal population due to the work of the rigs
and drills and to the inevitable pollution.
These questions are first to "Sakhalinmorneftegas" and then to its foreign
partners.
Konstantin Igrain
Nivkh
intern of IIC
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P.S:
For this particular project an international consortium "Sakhalin Energy
Investment Company, Ltd." was set up. The partners are ,Maraton Sakhalin,
Ltd.", "MacDermont Sakhalin, Inc.", "Mitsui Sakhalin Development Co,
Ltd.", "Shell Sakhalin Holding BV" and "Diamond Gas Sakhalin BV", a
daughter company of "Mitsubishi".