Home »
Think Like a Watershed with Canada’s famous freethinker
Columbia Basin residents to hear from renowned Canadian author at Watershed Symposium
John Ralston Saul, one of Canada’s renowned intellectuals and author of A Fair Country, will travel the Columbia Basin and present at the Salmon Festival in Revelstoke, and at Fairmont Hot Springs, as part of the Columbia Basin Watershed Network’s Think Like a Watershed Symposium.
Ralston Saul – author, philosopher, historian (and husband of former Governor General Adrienne Clarkson), will focus on cross-cultural interactions between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Canadians in relation to the environment and freshwater management in the Columbia River Basin.
“Within B.C., First Nations, including the Ktunaxa, Shuswap and Okanagan, have relied on the Columbia River to provide for their well-being, of which salmon were a key component” said Bill Green, Director of the Canadian Columbia River Inter-tribal Fisheries Commission.
Since the construction of Grand Coulee Dam (pictured above) in 1941, the ratification of the Columbia River Treaty in 1964, and the construction of several dams near the U.S. border, salmon have been unable to return to the B.C. portion of the river.
The historical journey of the salmon that once migrated to the headwaters of the Columbia River is the unifying theme for this year’s Watershed Symposium, which will examine the challenges and opportunities of holistic water governance, while considering First Nations leadership, climate change, and upcoming policy changes in the Columbia Basin.
The Symposium hosted by the Columbia Basin Watershed Network, with support from Living Lakes Canada, will also have several key presenters, panels and round table discussions with Robert Sandford, Chair of the Canadian Partnership for the UN Water for Life Decade, Oliver Brandes of the POLIS Project on Ecological Governance, Stephen Kakfwi the former premier of the NWT, Deborah Curran from the University of Victoria Faculty of Law, and Nelson Jatel of the Okanagan Basin Water Board.
“The vision for the event is to move toward a Columbia Basin watershed governance entity,” said Heather Leschied, Chair of the Columbia Basin Watershed Network. “This symposium will build an important dialogue to improve the way water is protected and managed in the Basin on a holistic scale.”
Event Schedule
September 27, at 6:30 p.m., Ralston Saul will address members of the North Columbia Environmental Society at the Performing Arts Centre in Revelstoke as part of the annual Salmon Festival celebrations.
September 28, at 6 p.m., Ralston Saul will deliver the keynote address along side Kathryn Teneese, Chair of the Ktunaxa First Nation during the Salmon Feast at Fairmont Hot Springs Resort, hosted by Living Lakes Canada.
September 29 and 30, Ralston Saul will be plenary speaker for the Columbia Basin Watershed Network Think Like a Watershed Symposium. A detailed agenda can be found at www.cbwn.ca.
The Think Like a Watershed Symposium is made possible with support from Living Lakes Canada, Real Estate Foundation of BC, Columbia Basin Trust, Teck, BC Hydro and Fortis BC.
Find out more by visiting www.cbwn.ca.
Grand Coulee Dam photo from gcdvisitor.com
Submitted