Large-Scale Tree Plantations

On the eve of the International Day of Struggle against Tree Monocultures, we invite you to participate in the webinar “Tree Plantations, Carbon Markets and Resistances”. It will be on Friday 20th September.

This briefing provides an overview of the expansion of tree plantations aimed at carbon markets. Where are these plantations located, who is profiting from them, what have been the impacts for communities living on the lands these projects occupy, and what international initiatives are taking place to boost tree plantations for carbon offsetting.

This publication exposes the most common misleading statements currently used by plantation companies. It’s is based on the briefing "Ten Replies to Ten Lies" written by Ricardo Carrere in 1999.

Under the guise of ‘conflict mediation’ and community empowerment, the work of certain corporate NGOs results in communities continuing without access to and control over their lands, and in strengthening destructive production models. One example is the Earthworm Foundation's partnership with palm oil agribusiness in several countries. See the article and interview below.

In South Africa's Western Cape province, rural communities affected by historical land dispossession in many places also face the manifold impacts of living surrounded by industrial tree plantations. Seeking to strengthen their access to land, these communities have mobilised in a forum supported by civil society organizations, demanding participation in decision-making and other community rights.

Several companies have been expanding their tree plantations in the Colombian Orinoquía, which is increasing longstanding conflicts and violence. “These are not reforestation companies, but deforestation companies, because they have introduced invasive tree species that are not native to the territory – like acacia, eucalyptus and pine trees. So they are driving out what naturally grows here” - Indigenous Sikuani Leader

In the first months of 2025, forest fires once again affected hundreds of families and burned tens of thousands of hectares in Argentine Patagonia. In this context, we are recalling an article from Aguayala published in WRM Bulletin 259, which explains how industrial pine plantations have been one of the main causes of not only deadly forest fires, but also land grab, deforestation, water depletion and violent conflicts with Mapuche communities. At the same time, such plantations have been falsely promoted as a solution to climate change.

Communities in the Apouh à Ngog region of Edéa, Cameroon, continue to resist the violence of the Socapalm company (a subsidiary of SOCFIN) and heavily armed soldiers who seek to prevent the community from recovering a portion of their ancestral lands for food crops, after years of occupation by industrial oil palm plantations. International and national opinion must be vigilant and keep an eye on this situation. 

On March 25, the palm oil company Socapalm, a subsidiary of the multinational Socfin-Bolloré, carried out a violent operation with security forces against a rural community that is demanding the return of its lands, in Apouh A Ngog village, in the Litoral Region of Cameroon. In an open letter, more than 50 organizations from different countries demanded that the country's authorities investigate and stop these atrocities and find an inmidate solution in favour of the community.

In the framework of International Women's Day, WRM is relaunching the podcast “Women’s struggles for land”, with stories from women’s collectives from the coastal area of Chiapas in Mexico, the Malen Chiefdom in Sierra Leone and the Kapuas river area of Central Kalimantan in Indonesia. While their stories appear quite different from each other at first glance, we find many commonalities and a strong connection between them.

WRM expresses its solidarity with the struggle of women from the Rural Landless Workers' Movement (MST) in Brazil. On this day, March 13, they are taking various actions across the country in favor of agrarian reform and against the multiple forms of violence perpetrated against women, under the slogan “Agribusiness means violence and environmental crimes. The struggle of women is against capital”. One of the actions is taking place in the state of Espírito Santo, where 1000 women have occupied an area belonging to Suzano.

The just-released “Mouila Declaration” is a message of resistance, solidarity and unity from communities and grassroots organisations of the Informal Alliance against the expansion of Industrial Monocultures.