That the Canadian rocker frequently puts his art at the service of charitable projects is nothing new, but this time the cause he has decided to dedicate himself to is generating a great deal of debate across Canada. On 12 January, a mini-tour called Honour the treaties set off from Toronto (the birthplace of Neil Young): four dates (in Toronto, Winnipeg, Regina and Calgary) through which the singer aims to raise funds for the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation (ACFN) – a local community that holds its own reserve in Alberta, to the south-west of Lake Athabasca – but above all to denounce the unsustainable and highly dangerous environmental policy that the Canadian government has been pursuing in recent years.

Some time ago (it was 2010), "mutant fish" were found in the waters of Lake Athabasca itself, the result of years of toxic discharges from one of Canada's richest "unconventional" oil deposits. These are vast areas of oil sands from which bitumen is extracted and then converted into crude oil at an enormously high environmental and energy cost: to produce the same quantity of oil as a "conventional" well, three times as much carbon dioxide is emitted. Yet the Alberta government has always denied the environmental and economic impact of these extraction activities. Indeed, in recent times expansion projects for these sand deposits have even been put forward, despite it being plain for all to see that much of the boreal forest in the area has already been destroyed.

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Neil Young, who visited one of the 50 Canadian sites of this kind with his son, described the experience as "the ugliest thing I have ever witnessed: a demonstration of greed and disrespect", and consequently decided to take a rather determined course of protest. The immediate trigger was, in fact, Ottawa's decision to allow oil giant Shell Oil to expand its Jackpine mine, which sits on land belonging to Canada's indigenous peoples and still protected by agreements.

At the press conference launching the mini-tour, Young thundered that the Canadian government is "completely out of control and money is the main reason." The response was swift: Prime Minister's spokesperson Jason MacDonald replied by arguing that "the resource sector creates economic opportunities and employs thousands of Canadians in middle- to high-paying jobs."

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… So much so that the "Honour the treaties" concerts have become one of the most successful initiatives of recent years for the singer, drawing in not only his fans but also a great many supporters of the environmental cause. At the upcoming Winnipeg date, Young will also be joined by jazz singer Diana Krall, who is extremely well known in Canada, while the final Calgary date is already sold out. All proceeds from the concerts will fund the ACFN legal action brought against Shell Oil for violations of the contractual agreements signed.