Earthworks Industries Inc. - CORTINA UPDATE

TSX-V: EWK
OTCQB: EAATF

VANCOUVER, BC, Oct. 21, 2025 Earthworks Industries Inc. (the "Company") issues this update to explain recent procedural developments regarding the Complaint filed by the Company's wholly owned U.S. subsidiary, Cortina Integrated Waste Management Inc., (CIWM) in the U.S District Court for the Eastern District of California, challenging the Order of the U.S. Department of the Interior's, Board of Indian Appeals (IBIA), purporting to cancel the federally approved lease between CIWM and the Kletsel Dehe Wintun Nation of the Cortina Rancheria, California.

On October 16, 2025, the parties entered a stipulation, which the Court approved, providing that the hearing currently set for October 27, 2025, is vacated, and that the Plaintiff's Motion for Summary Judgment and Federal Defendant's and Defendant-Intervenor's Cross-Motions for Summary Judgment shall be taken under submission, which it now has been, subject to the power of the Court to reopen the matter for further briefs or oral arguments or both, if the Court deems them necessary.

The reasons for the stipulations are as follows:

At the end of the day on September 30, 2025, the appropriations that have been funding the U. S. Department of Justice expired and appropriations to the Department lapsed. The Department does not know when funding will be restored by Congress. Absent an appropriation or continuing resolution, Department of Justice attorneys are prohibited from working, even on a voluntary basis, except in limited circumstances, including "emergencies involving the safety of human life or the protection of property." That exception is not deemed to include ordinary civil cases like ours.

Given the lapse in federal appropriations, and to reduce the burden, expense, and uncertainty surrounding travel arrangements and scheduling under the circumstances, the parties entered the stipulation. The parties recognize that the Court may reset the hearing for a future date if necessary and have requested that any such hearing be set for a date as soon as federal funding permits.

The Company looks forward to a successful affirmation by the Court of the validity and enforceability of the lease at Cortina.

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its regulation services provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this News Release.

SOURCE Earthworks Industries Inc.

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