Brazil

The Brazilian organizations Juízes para a Democracia (Judges for Democracy) and CIMI have launched a petition addressed to various Brazilian authorities to demand the urgent demarcation of indigenous lands in the country, particularly in view of the disastrous situation faced by the Guaraní-Kaiowá people in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul. The Guaraní-Kaiowá who live in the PyleitoKue/Mbarakay territory announced that they would rather die en masse than leave their territory in reponse to an eviction order and threats.

  Over the last two decades, the Latin America and Caribbean region has lost 9% of its forest cover, primarily as a result of logging, the expansion of agribusiness, major infrastructure projects like highways, hydroelectric dams, mining, oil drilling and urbanization, as well as forest fires and the conversion of forests to other land uses, largely caused by these same activities.

By Elder Andrade de Paula On the eve of another world conference on the environment – Rio+20 – which places emphasis on the climate crisis, we are witnessing major efforts by the centres of world power to promote a discussion with no real discussions. The worn-out model of “sustainable development”, now recycled under the new name of “green economy”, is being put forward as the only alternative to “save the planet”.

  “Sustainable on Paper”, a documentary film by journalists An-Katrien Lecluyse and Leopold Broers released in Belgium in 2011, is now available on the internet. The film broadly denounces the FSC certification of plantations owned by one of the biggest eucalyptus and pulp companies in Brazil, Veracel Celulosa, a joint venture of Brazilian-based Fibria and Swedish-Finnish transnational Stora Enso.

The traditional communities known as geraizeiras at the Vale do Guará Settlement, in the town of Rio Pardo de Minas, north of Minas Gerais, denounce that an airplane spraying poison on a major eucalyptus plantation has hit the community, intoxicating 30 people, including children, elderly, youth and adults. They felt nausea, fever, vomit and itching skin. Airplane spraying is increasingly common in Brazil – the world's champion in pesticide use.

The area planted with oil palm trees in Brazil used to be relatively small as compared to other countries producing this plant in Latin America. However, big transnational companies in Brazil like Vale and Petrobrás have revealed the rapid expansion of these plantations meant for the production of biofuels, in the Amazon region, mainly in the State of Pará.

Civil society organizations are denouncing the FSC certification of Fibria Celulose SA monoculture tree plantations by IMAFLORA, a Brazilian certification body. The organization’s demands are aimed at supporting the social and environmental battle carried out by the populations suffering the effects of cellulose plant projects, in this particular case, those by the firm Fibria (formerly Aracruz Celulose).

An article that analyzes the law passed in the Brazilian state of Acre in 2010 to create the State System of Incentives for Environmental Services (SISA). The law is considered a model and example for the world; however, it ultimately serves to turn over the state’s natural wealth, including its forests, to the financial speculation market.

After many years of supporting local struggles and disseminating information from different countries on tree monocultures and its impacts, WRM presents a new report to all those involved in these struggle (1). No better time than the month of September 21st, International Day of Struggle against Tree Monocultures (2), to launch this new report.

Several months ago (see WRM Bulletin 172) we reported on the plans of Suzano Papel e Celulose S. A. – the world’s second largest pulp producer – to invest in biomass plantations. Biomass energy is one of the market-driven false “solutions” to climate change. It promotes land grabbing and diverts attention from the need to effectively reduce carbon dioxide emissions at the source.