Treating Nature as a person

THE report “New Zealand river recognised as ‘legal person’” (The Star Online, March 16) strikes a chord with me although I am neither a naturalist nor an environmentalist. In this day and age when nature has suffered grave damage due to extensive commercial and leisure activities, it is heartening to know that major headway is still possible when it comes to protecting the environment.

The local Maori tribe in New Zealand’s North Island finally won their hard-fought battle of 140 years to have the Whanganui River, or Te Awa Tupua, recognised legally as a living entity, which, according to Attorney-General Chris Finlayson “will have its own legal identity with all the corresponding rights, duties and liabilities of a legal person.”