The film We Can’t Eat Gold, which focuses on the struggle against the proposed Pebble mine, has been updated and re-released to cover the Trump Administration’s recent dash to permit the proposed mine. You can watch it for free here.
“How does it feel when your ancestors have been surviving off the same land for thousands of years and then that land is threatened?” The Indigenous Peoples of Bristol Bay face this very question.
The Yup’ik-Eskimo, Aleut and Athabaskan Peoples continue to maintain the subsistence way of life practiced by their ancestors. The proposed Pebble Mine would seek to extract vast deposits of gold, copper, and molybdenum from the region, threatening that way of life.
The award-winning film, “We Can’t Eat Gold” gives voice to Elders and Youth alike who are concerned about the future impacts of the mine as well as ongoing impacts on Bristol Bay’s King Salmon and Caribou populations from exploration activities.
With the release of the EPA’s Bristol Bay Watershed Assessment, it would appear that the Pebble mine is done for. Northern Dynasty, the Canadian mining company behind the project, has no intention of simply giving up.
Fortunately, neither will the Indigenous Peoples of Bristol Bay and their many allies. There’s far too much at stake.