Large-Scale Tree Plantations

Smurfit Carton, subsidiary of Jefferson Smurfit, owns 34,000 hectares of monocultures of gmelina, eucalyptus and pine in the Venezuelan states of Portuguesa, Lara and Cojedes. 27,000 hectares are located in Portuguesa, where the company confronted the local communities of Morador and Tierra Buena, which resisted the invasion of tree plantations in their agricultural lands (see WRM Bulletins 18, 20, 22 and 23).

The new Government of Aotearoa -a coalition supported by the Greens- has banned the cutting of indigenous beech trees (and soon probably Rimu and other species), because of the enormous pressure on the country's remaining areas of natural forest, which include temperate rainforest and temperate dryforest.

Genetically engineered trees are a new threat pending on native forests and other ecosystems worldwide. The development of "Frankentrees" is being promoted by joint-ventures formed by biotechnology, chemical and paper giants, together with some of the world's largest landowners. Monsanto -which has a long dark history in the field of genetically engineered food- ForBio, International Paper, Fletcher Challenge Forests, GenFor, Canada Interlink, Silvagen, the Chilean Development Agency, Shell and Toyota are some of the firms involved in the development of this technology.

The U$S 3.5 million loan that the International Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank Group is about to award to the Liberian Agricultural Company (LAC) to develop a rubber plantation of 120,000 hectares in the Grand Bassa county is provoking growing concern in Liberia (see WRM Bulletin 29). The project is aimed at restarting operations and initiating a rehabilitation program of the plantation, which had been abandoned because of the civil war that affected the country between 1989 and 1997.

Due to a decline in log supply in their own country -as a consequence of years of depredatory practices- Malaysian logging companies have recently and rapidly expanded abroad. Some of them, together with oil palm plantation companies, are well known to the indigenous peoples of Sarawak for having negatively affected their livelihoods and promoted the destruction of the native forests. The Malaysian government has publically expressed the need for its country's companies to operate responsibly abroad, but reality seems far away from such concern.

 

The case of Sarawak is probably one of the best ones to show the importance of definitions. Tree plantations have been defined by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) as "planted forests" and the entire forestry profession -the "experts"- is totally unwilling to revisit such definition. The reason is that it serves their purposes -including their image and budgets- very well.

Genetically modified crops have been hogging the limelight of public opinion due to the controversy arising on their unpredictable consequences on health and the environment. Nevertheless, the genetic engineering of trees has been largely in the shadows. In the meantime, joint ventures of giant corporations were created to carry out research in the tree biotechnology field.

The Tupinikim and Guaraní of Espirito Santo, Brazil, have been struggling for years against powerful Aracruz Celulose in order to defend their traditional lands, that the company started to occupy in 1967. After having suffered intimidation and violence to the hands of the company and the military, and having taken direct actions of occupation of the lands that historically belong to them, in April 1998 the Tupinikim and Guaraní were forced into signing an agreement with the company, which was valid for a period of 20 years.

The World Bank is not a monolithic structure and many staff members are increasingly aware about the impacts that large-scale tree monocultures have on people and the environment. However, there are signs that within the Bank's higher hierarchies there is a will to promote such plantations, either as carbon sinks or as providers of raw material for the paper, timber and palm oil industries.

The World Bank's work in China's forest and forest-related sectors is portrayed as highly successful by the report, though including a number of recommendations for future work to address some current constraints.

The OED study on Costa Rica appears to be more focused in showing the achievements of the Costa Rican government and in supporting its policies than in evaluating the World Bank's implementation of its 1991 forest policy. However, the report contains interesting elements in this regard.