Ecuador

31 July 1998. Ecuador's Minister of Environment has promised Greenpeace that she will take steps to secure a permanent ban on mangrove clearcuts by the country's shrimp farming industry and investigate evidence of illegal mangrove destruction in a protected national reserve.

The following includes a description of the situation facing Yasuni National Park, a sign-on letter and an appeal to remain in contact with the campaign. If you or your organisation can sign on to the letter please respond to amazonia@hoy.net. A copy of the letter will be delivered to the President of Ecuador, the President of Petroecuador, the President of UNESCO and to interested oil companies. If you would like to send your own version please send a copy to us at the same e-mail address or at the following Fax Number 593-2-527-583

Shell is planning to start prospecting activities for oil exploitation at Pañacocha-Tiputini, located at the Cuyabeno Faunistic Reserve and the Yasuni National Park. The latter was declared World Biosphere Reserve by UNESCO and hosts ancestral indigenous communities and a variety of wildlife. It is a unique place for the pink dolphins, some varieties of tropical parrots (guamacayos), several species of monkeys and other mammals. Accion Ecologica calls the attention on the menace that Shell activities means for this region and expresses its determination to fight against it.

Resolution nr 007 of INEFAN -the Ecuadorian Forestry Agency- shows that, surprising as it may seam, it is in the way to permitting mining activities in forests that are part of the State National Forest Heritage. According to the Forestry Law, mining is not included among the authorized activities to be developed within Protective Forests.

Alvaro Gonzalez participated in a Seminar on Rural Development organized by the German foundation DSE, from 24/11 to 5/12. The Seminar included a journey to Mindo -a small town to the West of Quito- where the Project Mindo-Mandillo Protective Forest was evaluated. This Project is being implemented by a local NGO -”Amigos de la Naturaleza” (Friends of Nature)- with support from WWF. Their aim is to protect a 19000 hectares of natural forest -90% of which still primary- from logging for coal production and clearing for cattle raising.

The Steering Committe of Oilwatch was meeting in Quito on October 21st, when it received news that a group of indigenous women from the province of Pastaza -who had walked to Ecuador’s capital to demonstrate against oil exploration in their territory by the state-owned Tripetrol corporation- was being repressed by the police. The steering committee immediately suspended its session and went to express its support to the protesting women.

Indigenous women, some of them accompanied by their men and children, initiated a march on September 28 in Pastaza province -northern Ecuador- with the aim of joining the National Constitutional Assembly to be held in Quito on October 12.

Ricardo went to Ecuador invited by the Third World Ecological Studies Institute (Instituto de Estudios Ecologistas del Tercer Mundo) to deliver a number of conferences and a one week course of forests and plantations. Quito, Riobamba, Esmeraldas and Cuenca were the cities where the conferences were held, with an average of 100 people attending each. The course took place in the Amazonia.