Issue 189 - April 2013

Among many indigenous peoples, words are considered sacred, and must be used with care. But in today’s digitalized, high-speed, globalized world, words are not viewed this way. They are used carelessly, often without realizing the true meaning of what is being said or typed. And sometimes, often without meaning too, we end up inadvertedly reinforcing ideas, concepts and values implied by the words we use. On the other hand, those who promote the globalized market economy, such as big corporations, who are determined to continue pursuing limitless growth and have led us into so many serious problems, tend to devote a great deal of thought to the names they give to things.

According to the dictionary, to “grab” is to seize suddenly or roughly, sometimes forcibly or unscrupulously. It carries a connotation of greed, of grasping what one wants with no concern for the welfare of others.

Uganda like many other African countries is in the campaign drive of promoting plantations under the guise of creating income and other benefits for Ugandans, destroying a lot of natural resources including forests, wetlands and up hills. In the past ten years, thousands of hectares of forests have been destroyed and replaced by monocultures.

The indigenous network ALDAW in the Philippines(Ancestral Land/Domain Watch) is deeply concerned about the findings of a recent study it carried out in Southern Palawan. The research shows that oil palm development is impoverishing local indigenous communities while destroying biologically diverse environments. The ALDAW case study “The Palawan Oil Palm Geotagged Report 2013. The Environmental and Social Impact of Oil Palm Expansion on Palawan Unesco Man & Biosphere Reserve (The Philippines)”, can be accessed at http://www.regenwald.org/files/pdf/The-Palawan-Geotagged-Oil-Palm-Report-Part-1.pdf and

The certification of industrial tree plantations by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) has served as a tool to legitimize the large-scale monoculture plantation model. The FSC’s internationally recognized certification scheme is supposed to ensure consumers that the companies that have been awarded its “green” label practise “environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial and economically viable” forest management.

While land grabbing is generally associated with the taking over of land for large scale monoculture plantations, grown for export-crops or conservation projects like REDD, the Ogoni people in the Niger Delta have faced another form of land grab – the loss of their territories, traditional lands, fertile mangrove and river systems to the oil companies that have been devastating the region for decades.

Organizations and individuals in the state of Acre and other states in Brazil sent an open letter this month to the governor of California and the California REDD Offset Working Group, challenging the legitimacy of a “consultation” carried out – through three workshops in California and over the internet, in English – regarding the inclusion of REDD offsets, primarily from Acre, in California’s carbon trading scheme. As of April 30, 2013, the working group will consider this “consultation” to be concluded and will submit its recommendations to the government of California.

REDD has been contentious ever since it was presented during UN climate talks in Bali, Indonesia, in 2007 as a way to supposedly reduce deforestation. In addition to pointing out that REDD as a carbon market instrument is a false solution to climate change, many indigenous peoples in particular have expressed concern that REDD will undermine indigenous peoples’ rights, become a mechanism that divides communities and will put indigenous peoples’ control over and access to their traditional territories at risk.

In March 2013, the presidents of the so-called BRICS countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – met in Durban, South Africa. Surrounded by security barriers so that no one who would dare to protest could get near them, the presidents of these nations discussed a number of issues, including cooperation proposals. One of the proposals most widely highlighted in coverage of the event was the creation of a BRICS development bank, with USD 50 billion in seed capital contributed in five equal parts by the bloc’s member countries.

In an international context of growing privatization and concentration of wealth, a process that is also manifested through land grabbing, financial actors are seeking out mechanisms that will enable their speculative activities. The circulation of enormous amounts of money is needed, and the international financial institutions and multilateral banks have fulfilled this role. The World Bank has been instrumental in the promotion of policies that have led to the current state of affairs, in which deforestation worsens, climate change continues, and social inequalities grow deeper.

Genetically Engineered Eucalyptus Plantations Threaten Communities and Forests Around the World In the United States, the US Department of Agriculture, which oversees the approval and release of GMOs in the US, has recently begun the process of legalizing the release of the very first genetically engineered (GE) forest tree in the US – a eucalyptus hybrid genetically engineered to be freeze tolerant. It will not, however, only impact forests and communities in the US, but all over the world.

Outraged by the rampant land grabs and neocolonialism of REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest degradation), Africans at the World Social Forum in Tunisia took the historic decision to launch the No REDD in Africa Network and join the global movement against REDD. “REDD is no longer just a false solution but a new form of colonialism,” denounced NnimmoBassey, Alternative Nobel Prize Laureate, former Executive Director of ERA/Friends of the Earth Nigeria. “In Africa, REDD+ is emerging as a new form of colonialism, economic subjugation and a driver of land grabs so massive that they may constitute a continent grab. We launch the No REDD in Africa Network to defend the continent from carbon colonialism.”

The Eastern Amazon Forum (FAOR) of Brazil issued a public statement in April in support of the Munduruku indigenous people, in response to the recent invasion of their lands in Medio Tapajós, Itaituba. This indigenous territory is the proposed site for the construction of the Tapajós Hydroelectric Dam Complex, despite the fact that Munduruku community leaders have repeatedly expressed their opposition to these plans. In late March, the federal government launched “Operation Tapajós”, sending in soldiers and armed police to ensure the completion of the studies needed to move ahead with the planned construction of 30 hydropower plants in the Tapajós River basin.

On March 17, several indigenous community leaders from the village of Montaña de Santa María Xalapán, located in southeastern Guatemala in the municipality of San Rafael Las Flores, were kidnapped. The following morning, it was reported that one of them, Exactación Marcos Ucelohabía, had been murdered. According to one of the survivors, “They accused him of opposing the mining company, and said they would kill him.”

The big coal burning utilities in the UK and elsewhere are trying to get around new EU sulphur dioxide regulations that would otherwise require them to shut down. DRAX, the UK’s biggest coal power station, seeks to convert half of their facility to burn wood pellets in place of coal, thus receiving subsidies for what is classified and supported lavishly as “renewable energy”.

In Champerico, Guatemala, the Bolas River had completely disappeared, after it was diverted and dammed to provide water for oil palm and sugar cane plantations. The loss of the river, which normally flows into the wetlands and mangrove forests of Champerico, severely affected the ecosystems and communities in the area. The communities fought back by protesting this “grabbing” of the river and creating a committee to look into the problem. On April 9, community representatives of Champerico and local authorities determined the location where the Bolas River had been diverted: a dam had been constructed on the La Finca estate, where there are oil palm and sugar cane plantations. The committee proceeded to open part of the dam to release the river water.

 “‘Quick-fix’ development gives away more than it gets back.” Samuel Nguiffo, from the Center for the Environment and Development (CED) in Yaounde, Cameroon, gives an overview of land grabbing in Africa from a grassroots perspective. Athttp://www.palmwatchafrica.org/land-giveaways-quick-fix-development/

“Special Focus: REDD+”, a blog site devoted to academic articles on REDD, with a critical focus put together by Tracey Osbourne, a professor of Political Ecology at the University of Arizona. At ppel.arizona.edu

“EJOLT Environmental Justice Project updates”, April 2013. At http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=19d3da1852472c315fcece5dd&id=1853241149&e=e8c7b5f4d4

“Land concentration, land grabbing and people’s struggles in Europe,” a new report by European Coordination Via Campesina and Hands off the Land network which shows that land grabbing and access to land are a critical issues today in Europe, and also reveals that the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) subsidy scheme and other policies is implicated in a variety of ways. At http://www.eurovia.org/IMG/pdf/Land_in_Europe.pdf

“EU ETS myth busting: why it cannot be reformed and should not be replicated,” a report released by a group of 45 organisations busting the myths that are holding up the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS). At http://scrap-the-euets.makenoise.org/eu-ets-myth-busting/