Jet Skis Hit Heavy Water: After much legal prodding from Earth Island’s Blue Water Network (BWN), the US National Park Service has taken action to reduce pollution in our public waters by banning jet skis in 75 percent of the America’s national parks. BWN has promised to continue fighting until all the remaining parks are “Jet-ski-Free.”

Capping a year-long effort, BWN activists led by Kathryn Morgan, convinced San Francisco’s supervisors to ban the operation of jet skis anywhere within a 1,200-foot shoreline buffer zone – the toughest such regulation in the US. On the state level, BWN convinced the California Air Board to toughen regulations on highly polluting marine two-stroke engines and enact a ban on sales of two-strokes within the year.

Welcome Aboard: Earth Island Institute is pleased to announce the addition of two new projects to our network. Jeanny Wang will be heading the China Biodiversity Network [300 Broadway, No.. 28, San Francisco, CA 94133, (415) 788-3666 x. 231, tadpole@igc.org] and Alaskan activist Gershon Cohen's Campaign to Safeguard America's Waters [Box 956, Haines, AK 99827, (907) 723-4121, gershon@seaknet.alaska.edu] will be directing a project that examines how Alaska’s water quality is effected by the federal government’s little-known “mixing- zone” laws.

Working (Bio)Intensively: After working for the last three years in western Kenya, Earth Island’s Global Service Corps (GSC) has returned to eastern Kenya to re-activate its Biointensive Agriculture Program. In September, GSC volunteer Diana Courtright traveled to rural Kibwezi – halfway between Nairobi and the port city of Mombasa – to help residents establish a community garden to provide nourishment, income and pride in the environment. Before traveling to Kenya, Diana trained in the US with biointensive agriculture expert John Jeavons. It is hoped that Diana will be the first of many GSC volunteers to assist rural populations in establishing similar sustainable agriculture projects.

Borneo Project Ally Wins Award: In recognition of his extraordinary work defending Borneo’s rainforests, Jok Jau Evong, a Kayan farmer from the interior of Borneo, has been honored with the Condé Nast Traveler's ninth annual Environmental Award.

For years Earth Island’s Borneo Project has dreamed of bringing a delegation from Uma Bawang to the project’s sister-city – Berkeley, California. If all goes well, Jok will arrive in Los Angeles in mid-October to receive the Condé Nast award and then will travel north to meet with friends and supporters in Berkeley.

For more than a decade, Jok has worked to preserve the rainforests that have sustained Uma Bawang and other indigenous communities for generations. In 1987, logging companies bulldozed Uma Bawang’s communcal longhouse and ancestral orchard. In response, the commumity blockaded a logging road and 42 residents of were arrested and imprisoned. Jok petioned for his neighbors’ release and initiated a ten-year-long legal battle that was recently decided in the community's favor.

As the President of the Uma Bawang Residents' Association, Jok has developed many projects to help indigenous communities cope with the effects of logging and oil palm plantation development. These include a communal fish pond and rice bank, a participatory mapping project and a highly successful reforestation project – all recognized by the government as models for community self-development.

In 1993, as Jok was to attended an international conference on indigenous peoples in Peru, the Malaysian government arbitrarily confiscated his passport. His passport case is pending in the Malaysian High Court of Appeals. It would be ironic if the Malaysian Government failed to return Jok’s passport and the Condé Nast Traveler Award winner was not allowed to travel.

Wildlife Alive Takes the Initiative: Earth Island’s Wildlife Alive is backing Proposition 4 on California’s November ballot. This citizen's initiative, which qualified for the ballot through the efforts of thousands of volunteer signature-gatherers, would ban the use of steel-jawed traps for fur-hunting and predator control. Prop. 4 also would ban indiscriminate wildlife poisons, including Compound 1080 (which is implanted in sheep collars to kill wolves) and sodium cyanide (which is contained in exploding M-44 bait- traps).

“Thousands of bobcats, beavers, raccoons and other species are killed for fur or to protect livestock in California every year,” states Wildlife Alive Director Mark J. Palmer. “Proposition 4 will end the slaughter and encourage non-lethal alternatives – such as better livestock husbandry practices – that protect our wildlife heritage.”