Forest
Biodiversity
Here we are,
defending the forests, but dealing with schizophrenia. This schizophrenia
is due to the fact that many governments want to conserve biodiversity,
but at the same time they are driven by the predominant economic model
that destroys their natural heritage. It is due to the fact that the
financial multilateral institutions are imposing economic adjustment
programs upon developing countries, which oblige them to devastate
their territories and surrender their economies, while at the same
time they impose poverty mitigating schemes. These institutions have
become useful tools for transnational corporations: they are wolves
disguised as sheep. The industrial and commercial actors that are
responsible for the erosion of biological and cultural diversity are
being exposed as conservation champions. There is a lot of talk about
conservation, but little is done by the policy makers. They announce
investments and cooperation initiatives for sustainable development,
but there are no effective commitments in this respect.
These are some
examples of the unsustainable nature of the above-mentioned model:
- The Brazil-Bolivia
gas pipeline that destroys the Chiquitano forest;
- The Pan
American highway, which is silently encroaching the Darien area
and the Choco bioregion;
- The Chad-Cameroon
oil pipeline;
- The Yacyreta
hydroelectric dam;
- The conversion
of native forests in Indonesia into monoculture oil palm plantations;
- The massive
sprays of pesticides, which threaten the Amazonian region and fail
to eradicate coca plantations; and
- The misleading
terminology that enables Eucalyptus, Pine and Acacia monoculture
plantations – which have dramatically eroded water resources in
South Africa - to be considered as forests.
Biodiversity
conservation and sustainable societies result from a choice in lifestyle.
Conservation and sustainability will not be achieved as long as economism
and greed continue to pervade all human activities. It is in the resistance
to this predominant model, where peoples find sustainability and strengthen
their true ethic commitment to securing a path towards life, and forest
preservation. Other examples of this are the U’wa peoples’ resistance
to oil exploitation in their ancestral land and the Costa Rican people’s
decision to prevent oil exploration in their territory.
At our boot
you will find a document that further elaborates these real success
stories of forest conservation.
So the Convention
on Biodiversity must deal with the direct and underlying causes of
forest biodiversity loss and create the conditions to address them;
- Promote
the recognition of indigenous peoples and local communities land
rights;
- Foster democratisation
of multilateral financial institutions and changes in the international
economic order;
- Collaborate
with the Convention on Climate Change to stop global warming and
its impacts on biodiversity;
- Ensure fair
and sustainable access to and distribution of natural resources;
and
- Elaborate
a definition on forests based on an ecosystem approach which clearly
differentiate it from tree monocultures.
