Businessman promotes spiritual economics

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Elmer Ghostkeeper is nothing if not determined. He has an idea. He will talk about his idea if you will listen. But few really hear him on this occasion, a luncheon at the first Metis economic development conference.

Ghostkeeper's message is not palatable to many in this group, who talk of setting up businesses which will service the oil, gas and timber industries.

But Ghostkeeper is going to keep on delivering his message until someone hears him, because he thinks it is a matter of life and death. The Winterburn-area businessman and Morgan horse breeder wants aboriginal business people to get back to their roots. He wants them to stop hurting the earth just to make a living. He also wants them to think of aboriginal art as a business.

Now this may not be a new idea, but Ghostkeeper has a new name for it, and a new slant on it. He calls it spiritual economics, and he thinks Native people can be the leaders in this, a return to co-operating with nature rather than exploiting her, and a return to simpler occupations which renew us.

For example, he said, Native people should consider businesses involving growing trees rather than chopping them down.

"Tree farms, not the kind where you grow trees to be harvested, but growing native species for sale - like Saskatoon bushes."

At the conference, Ghostkeeper had the podium to deliver his message. Many people listened thoughtfully, but just as many returned to their talks on how to set up trucking companies.

In an interview following his talk, Ghostkeeper said he knows some Native

people don't want to hear his ideas right now. He said it is because they are being sold

on businesses tied into the dying industrial age.

"What I suggest is people should understand that the information and service economy is replacing the industrial age."

Native people should look to their natural creativity. Rather than looking to industrial-age businesses. Natives should look to arts and crafts and the information and service sectors.

"Media, government, all fast food outlets and malls are part of the information and service economy.