Aboriginals may collect driftwood: The Council of Indigenous Peoples

The CIP, in association with the Council of Agriculture (COA), gazetted the administration rule Thursday at a news conference concerning the legitimacy of the rights to their traditional areas by the Atayal tribespeople living in two mountainous villages in Chienshih township of the northern county of Hsinchu.

With the publication of the rule, it is now legal for Atayal people living in Chienshih township’s Yufeng village and Hsiuluan village to pick up and keep fallen trunks, waste wood and all other crops or produce from the forests in their neighborhood, an area of about 37,000 hectares, said CIP Minister Icyang Parod.

The rule is not only significant in terms of returning native areas to the indigenous people, it is also partly an effort realizing President Chen Shui-bian’s ideal and promise to the aborigines to develop a “partnership” between the Democratic Progressive Party administration and the country’s indigenous people, Parod said.

He said Yufeng and Hsiuluan villages were first selected as locations to implement the “return of traditional areas to the indigenous people” program because as recently as six months ago, an Atayal resident in Smangus — the most remote and deep-mountain Atayal area on the border of Hsinchu County and eastern Yilan County — was charged and convicted of theft for picking up a fallen trunk in the forest near his home.

Also speaking at the news conference, COA Vice Minister Lee Chien-chuan expressed hope that related regulations will be hammered out soon so that all indigenous people in the country can be protected by the regulations and enjoy legal access to natural products in their neighborhoods.

Chienshi rural township head Tseng Hsiao-chung, Yufeng village chief Chen Jung-kuang, Hsiuluan village chief You You-lien and several dozen village people traveled from the mountains to Taipei to witness the publication of the rule.

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