Brazil:
Occupation of Veracel’s tree plantations calls upon land reform
April 17 has been declared
by La Via Campesina the “International Day of Peasant’s Struggles”
to commemorate the slaughter by the Brazilian police in 1996 of
19 peasants of the “landless” movement while they mobilized to get
access to some land.
The land issue has
becoming a major one in Brasil and the Movement of Landless Rural
Workers MST have been very active.
On last April 8, 1,500
landless families of the MST occupied the landholding Putumuju,
of the pulp and paper company Veracel Celulose (a joint venture
of the Swedish-Finnish pulp giant Stora Enso and Brazilian-based
Aracruz Celulose), in Eunápolis, south of the state of Bahia. They
cut down around 2 hectares of eucalyptus trees to make way for maize
and bean planting.
The action claimed
the illegality of Veracel’s tree plantations in the municipality.
The company occupies near 205,000 hectares of which some 96,000
are covered by eucalyptus plantations at the expense of the Atlantic
Forest. Veracel’s deforestation with tractors and bulldozers during
its first year of operation led on 17 June 2008, to a historic resolution
of a federal court which ordered Veracel to replant those plantations
with native trees and pay a fine of US$ 12,5 million (see WRM Bulletin
Nº 132).
Furthermore, over 20,000
hectares of those plantations are established on lands belonging
to the Bahia state government that should be destined to land reform
for small-scale agriculture (“terras devolutas”) as the Federal
Constitution determines.
The action aimed at
raising awareness amid the Brazilian society about the urgency of
setting in motion the standing Agrarian Land Reform as well as to
denounce that Veracel’s power has led to the disappearance of several
agricultural subsistence crops in Eunápolis and land concentration
at the expense of peasants. The MST wants to discuss the tree monoculture
production in the state and the regularization of the 'terras devolutas'.
"Over the past two years no lands have been taken by the government
for land reform" and, according to Marcio Matos from the state
direction of the MST, "while one company has here more than
20,000 hectares of lands that should be used to end with poverty
and hunger in the region".
The office of the Secretary
of Agriculture of the State of Bahia, in the state capital Salvador,
was also occupied on April 14, with the aim of putting pressure
on the state government to comply with the promises made in 2007,
including field inspection of potential land reform areas.
La Via Campesina
calls upon everyone to unite on this April 17 for peasant's rights
(rights to land, right to seeds, right to water...) organising a
demonstration, a public debate, a movie screening, a local food
expo, a fiesta, a direct action, a singing competition, etc. (To
join the action, subscribe to the distribution list for April 17
by sending a message without text to:
http://viacampesina.net/mailman/listinfo/via.17april_viacampesina.net)
