- Argentina: One year after the Esquel "NO", a national network against mining is born

On 4 December, thousands of people from cities and villages in the Provinces of Chubut and Rio Negro again marched together with the neighbours of Esquel to say “NO to the Mine.” This reaffirmation by the people took place in the midst of a new mining encroachment, as personnel of these corporations are scouring the outskirts of Cholila (in Chubut, a few kilometres from the Los Alerces National Park). If mining activities continue, various lake systems and the Patagonian Andean forest will be endangered. The fear of the population is no longer over the initiation of exploitation, but over the very stage of exploration itself. In this phase, the mining company Meridian Gold contaminated the rivers of Esquel (Huemules and Willa) and the Barrick Gold Company dumped hydrocarbons in groundwater in the province of San Juan (Valle del Cura – Pascua Lama Project).

The contagious firmness of the people of Esquel, who do not bow to the threats and attacks against the premises of the “Self-convened Neighbours for NO,” and the seriousness of the mining threat led to a meeting in Buenos Aires on 24 and 25 November of delegations from Catamarca, San Juan, Chubut, Tucuman, Cordoba and Rio Negro, where they set up the National Network of Communities affected by Mining.

The meeting provided an opportunity for the delegates to get to know the problems of the centre, west and northwest of Argentina. The testimonials of the Catamarca and Tucuman delegations, affected by the exploitation of the Bajo La Alumbrera gold deposits, were conclusive. This activity compromises the Sali-Dulce basin and contamination is not only having an impact on these provinces but also on Santiago del Estero, Cordoba and Santa Fe. The Tucuman representative warned that the "yunga" forest (dry tropical forest) is threatened by the implementation of 37 mining enterprises.

The delegation from San Juan repeated this warning and stated that the exploitation of the Veladero gold mine, to take place shortly, will compromise the Jachel River basin and affect the San Guillermo Biosphere Reserve (declared World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1984).

Although the future looks gloomy, the firmness of the Esquel population and of the neighbouring villages constitute a ray of hope that people will grow in number and courage in Argentina, in their awareness of the danger they are facing.

By: Hernan Scandizzo, e-mail: herscan@data54.com

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- Brazil: Plantar counterattacks after receiving award for worst carbon sink project

The Plantar forestry company located in the State of Minas Gerais has large eucalyptus plantations in the zone, established at the expense of evicting the local populations. They were also established at the expense of the typical forest in the zone (the “cerrado”), and the trees were converted into charcoal to supply the iron and steel industry and replaced by eucalyptus, planted for the same objective. The company’s social, environmental, economic and cultural impacts were widely documented in recent research work carried out by WRM (“Certifying the uncertifiable: FSC certification of tree plantations in Thailand and Brazil”), which sets out the impacts such as appropriation of lands and eviction of the inhabitants, depletion and contamination of water and soils, deforestation, destruction of biodiversity, net loss of jobs, bad working conditions, loss of livelihoods, and risks to health, among others.

In spite of that, the World Bank decided to approve the Plantar plantations as its first carbon sink project within the portfolio of the Prototype Carbon Fund (PCF), later validated by the SCS consulting firm, supposedly on the basis of Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) standards.

All seemed to be going well for the company and the World Bank, until on 9 December, in the framework of the 9th Conference of the Parties to the Climate Change Convention held in Milan, the Global Forest Coalition designated the company as winner of the 2003 Treetanic Award, granted annually to the worst carbon sink project. In their grounds for this award they stated that “in spite of the merits of the World Bank, the Prototype Carbon Fund and the State Government of Minas Gerais, the Global Forest Coalition is convinced that Plantar's past and present record of social and environmental destruction are sufficiently outstanding to be declared as the undisputed winner of the 2003 Treetanic Award.

However, the company did not feel flattered by the award. On the contrary, the following day, the directors Marcos de Deus and Marcos Vinicius called a meeting of the leaders of the Rural Workers’ Trade Union (STR) of the Municipality of Curvelo in Minas Gerais. There the company exerted extreme pressure on the leaders, demanding that they sign a letter addressed to the World Bank, the text of which had been previously prepared. In their pressure on the STR leaders, the Plantar bureaucrats threatened once more with dismissals in Curvelo, in the event that the carbon credits were not forthcoming – unmistakable proof of the company’s lack of economic feasibility unless State incentives, green labelling and carbon credits are forthcoming. Putting pressure one by one on the leaders present there, like in a scene of Russian roulette, the company gathered the signatures it wanted, except that of Gracie dos Reis, who wrote “under pressure” next to her signature. The director Marcos de Deus threatened to bring a court case against her.

In the letter to the World Bank, the Curvelo STR assents (under pressure) that Geraldo Martins, the trade union’s lawyer, was present at the COP9 in Milan, representing the organizations Network Alert Against the Green Desert, FASE and others, but not the local STR. An attempt is thus being made to create a climate of local opposition against Geraldo Martins, who is described as contrary to the creation of jobs in Curvelo. An attempt is also being made at dividing the Municipalities of Montes Claros and Curvelo, stating that in Milan, Geraldo Martins had criticised monoculture tree plantations, while Eliseu Oliveira from Montes Claros, had defended them. This falsity was denied in a message by both, in which they state:

“We were officially accredited as delegates to the conference and we met yesterday with PCF investors. We talked to them about the environmental impacts that eucalyptus plantations cause in our regions, the drying up of springs and rivers, and the eviction of local communities. We showed them the number of jobs generated by eucalyptus plantations and compared them with the number of jobs generated by other crops such as guayaba, coffee, corn, cattle raising, milk, particularly in the States of Espirito Santo and Minas Gerais, and more precisely in the areas of Plantar and Aracruz.

We told them about the uncertainty of employment, the health of workers in this employment and as an example referred to an accident that took place recently in Curvelo, causing the death of 11 workers and leaving two others mutilated. Added to this, is the fact that the companies adopt a rotational system among the workers to prevent them from ensuring labour rights, and even dismissing workers with work-related health problems. We asked them not to consider eucalyptus plantations in the Clean Development Mechanism or as carbon sinks because the plantations are only aimed at producing charcoal for the iron and steel works and pulp mills, without respecting the native vegetation.

To plant the eucalyptus, native trees are uprooted, and it is like uprooting our culture, our customs and the roots of our hearts. We have submitted alternative projects for a true agrarian reform, generating more jobs, fighting against hunger and misery and consolidating the Zero Hunger Programme, respecting trees, animals, water and life. Global warming has been caused by developed countries and the countries of the Third World should not be obliged to clean up contamination by the indiscriminate plantation of trees. We ended by saying that we were talking about the anguish of a people and they told us it was the beginning of a dialogue.”

Are the old military dictatorship methods back? Does Plantar have the right to repress the opinion of people who are not in agreement with the shameful process of environmental degradation caused by monoculture eucalyptus plantations? The above only goes to confirm that Plantar merits the award it has received. And if it continues along the same path, it will surely receive many more.

Source: in view of the present situation triggered off by the company, WRM has omitted the sources of the information on which it based the present article, considering that if it made them public it might be dangerous for those who sent us the information.

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- Chile: Mapuche question agreement between forestry companies and environmental NGOs

On 12 December, the Matte (CMPC companies), Angelini (Arauco) forestry groups and a number of Chilean and US environmental NGOs signed an agreement (see http://www.wrm.org.uy/countries/Chile/article2.html ) whereby the companies have agreed to conserve the areas of native forest existing on their properties – representing 2.8% of the total surface of the native forests in the country – and not replace them by tree plantations.

The Mapuche Coordination of Organizations and Territorial Identities has questioned this agreement (see http://www.wrm.org.uy/countries/Chile/article3.html ). In a declaration mainly aimed at American Lands Alliance, but also at the other signatories of the agreement, the Mapuche Coordination recognizes the value of the campaign promoted by these organizations in the United States in favour of the protection of the native forest and even their denunciation of the situation facing the Mapuche communities because of plantation expansion. However, the Mapuche Coordination considers that the conditions are not appropriate for negotiations with these forestry companies.

Furthermore, the Mapuche organizations also questioned the call to promote Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification or other similar schemes, because this implies endorsing forestry invasion and the serious conflicts that the Mapuche communities are facing, such as territorial conflicts, decrease and loss of water resources, poverty, migration, unemployment, clear-felling in a country that is generally mountainous, pressure and enclosing of communities, causing irreparable damage to their social, cultural and spiritual life.

CMPC and Arauco are among the entities controlling the timber market and have been protected by the Chilean State. They have triggered off conflicts that have ended in the militarization of Mapuche "reducciones" (Indian villages) with the application of laws inherited from the Pinochet dictatorial regime, such as the Law for State domestic security and the Anti-terrorist Law. The Mapuche have suffered from many arrests, persecutions, police repression and even the murder of 17 year-old Alex Lemun, by the Chilean police in the property of the Mininco Forestry Company (a member of the CMPC group) on 7 November 2002 (see WRM Bulletin No. 64).

Furthermore, the bill on native forests presently under discussion, establishes a subsidy of 5 Monthly Tax Units (Unidades Tributarias Mensuales – UTM) per hectare for those who fence in their properties, allowing for natural regeneration and the recovery of degraded forests. There is a bonus of up to 5 UTM per hectare to achieve the preservation of forests of high ecological value and to maintain biological diversity. In figures, conservation would become another business for the companies, and they would be collecting over 180 million dollars.

The Mapuche organizations consider that any negotiation with these companies may have negative effects on the fair statement of their needs, problems and respective solutions. It would only serve to continue consolidating international timber export markets, with their corollary of expansion of plantations, annexing Mapuche territory and benefiting from the vulnerability that these communities and small scale peasants are suffering from, to encourage them to be the ones to plant pines and eucalyptus.

The forestry sector economic groups are directly responsible for the marginalization and oppression in which political networks maintain the Mapuche people. The Mapuche organizations, for their part, propose curbing forestry expansion to protect the natural resources and to transform the present political, social and legislative relations that this People face within the Chilean State. This is why they are underscoring the importance of understanding that Mapuche interests should not be opposed to the interests of NGOs regarding environmental protection and more specifically, that of forest conservation.

Article based on information from: “Acuerdo forestales, ambientalistas y Presidente Lagos”, MAPUEXPRESS, 15 November 2003, http://www.mapuexpress.net ; “¿Qué hay detrás de estos acuerdos? Acuerdo entre CMPC y Arauco con ambientalistas sobre el bosque nativo”, Homero Altamirano, 18 November 2003, published in the Llanalhue noticias newspaper (Cañete VIII Region); Letter from the Mapuche Coordination of Organizations and Territorial Identities to American Lands, Forestethics, Greenpeace, Defensores del Bosque, TERRAM, Instituto de Ecología Política.

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- Colombia: The uncertifiable plantations of a member of the FSC Board of Directors

In 1998, the author Joe Broderick finished his research on the Smurfit Carton de Colombia company, publishing his book “El imperio de cartón: impacto de una multinacional papelera en Colombia” (The Cardboard empire: the impact of a multinational paper company in Colombia). In this book he provides details of the serious social and environmental impacts caused by the activities of a branch of the Irish transnational company, Jefferson Smurfit in that country.

In November this year, WRM was invited by Colombian organizations to visit the region affected by Smurfit's pine and eucalyptus plantations, to observe the problems and listen to the opinions of the local inhabitants in person. The visit not only fully confirmed the information provided by Broderick, but also showed that the company has not changed one iota of its policies regarding people and the environment and that their relationship with the local society continues to be as problematic as it was when the book was first published.

None of this should astonish us, as the impacts of a branch of the same company had been recorded by WRM in the neighbouring Venezuela, following a similar visit carried out in December 1998 to the plantations of Smurfit Carton de Venezuela Company. In an article written after this visit we concluded that "the ’development’ model implemented by Smurfit in Portuguesa is unsustainable, regarding both social and environmental impacts. In spite of its policy of harassment and repression, the company does not seem to have much success in overcoming the determination of the people to oppose their activities and a major question mark appears regarding how long the plantations will be able to survive (even protected by barbed wire, dogs and armed men), being surrounded by hundreds of people who hate those trees and the company that they represent. If tree plantations are unsustainable in general, in this case they seem to be less sustainable that ever.”

Something similar could be said of the impacts in Colombia, where the company has been involved in deforestation processes, where there have been severe impacts on water, fauna and flora and where it has been a key factor in the eviction of the rural population in the zones where it has established itself. All this, and much more, became evident from the interviews WRM held last month with the local population.

The local people told us that “the plantations have finished off the water,” that “spraying has finished with everything there was in the soil,” that “there is hardly any fauna left,” that there used to be “clouds of birds” and that now “only in the summer does some bird appear, but not in winter time,” and that “there are no fish left either.”

Regarding employment, they reported “all the work is seasonal” (it is outsourced) and that “the contract implies working for two and earning for one.” Like in the jungle, only the fittest survive: “if you don’t reach production, they remove you, you can’t be over 40 and we all have to be strong to reach that production.” Regarding worker organization, not only is there no trade union, but “he who grumbles is out” and “here no comments are made.”

With this curriculum, no one would think that the company might be interested in the subject of certification of timber produced in a socially and environmentally responsible way. Its over 60,000 hectares of monoculture tree plantations are not certified and we doubt that they ever will be. Therefore, we are amazed that Smurfit is a member of the board of directors of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), considered to be one of the most credible certification systems on an international level. The FSC web page informs us that Mr. Victor Giraldo represents the company on the FSC board of directors.

Its presence does little good to FSC and someone should start asking the relevant questions. For our part, we are at FSC’s disposal to elaborate on the information we have on the company.

Article based on information from Carrere, R. “Report on a visit to regions in Colombia with Smurfit plantations, 31/10/03 - 7/11/03” (internal report), FSC web page: http://www.fscoax.org/html/5-1-1.html ; Broderick, J. "El imperio de cartón: impacto de una multinacional papelera en Colombia", Bogotá, Planeta, 1998; Carrere, R. "Smurfit Cartón de Venezuela: las plantaciones de la discordia" http://www.revistadelsur.org.uy/revista.087-088/WRM.html )