Amazon Indigenous Groups Oppose Infrastructure Projects
1/18/98
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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Amazon Indigenous Groups Oppose Infrastructure Projects
Source: Danielle Knight
Global Environment Editor
Inter Press Service 202-662-7161 work
1293 National Press Building 202-662-7164 fax
Washington, DC 20045 202-462-4995 home
Status: Distribute freely with credit to source
Date: 1/18/98
Byline: By Danielle Knight
WASHINGTON, Jan 18 (IPS) - Indigenous groups in the Amazon Basin
of Latin America, the most biologically diverse rainforest on
earth, are pushing ahead to oppose infrastructure projects they
believe will lead to the destruction of their homelands.
''Together, our peoples are seeking a new development model for
the region,'' says Jose Adalberto Macuzi, a coordinator of the
Brazilian Indigenous Council in the state of Roraima (CIR). A
new report reveals progress made since the First International
Seminar of Indigenous Peoples held in August 1997 in the
northern Brazilian Amazon town of Boa Vista.
At that meeting Indigenous leaders from Brazil, Guyana and
Venezuela discussed the potential impact of proposed development
projects - such as roads, power lines, waterways, pipelines, and
refineries - aimed to promote free trade in the region.
''Considering the multi-national nature of the development in
the region, this exciting meeting enabled indigenous peoples to
come together despite their language differences and work on
solutions,'' Melina Selverston, director of the Washington-based
Coalition for Amazonian Peoples and Their Environment, an
advocacy group that participated in the seminar, told IPS.
Almost all the planned or partially completed projects are
designed to run through millions of hectares of indigenous
territories, dense forests, and complex river and swamp
ecosystems, and would bring far-reaching changes to the Amazon.
Extraction of resources - from gold in the Brazilian state of
Roraima to natural gas in Bolivia - will increase when these
projects get under way.
Governments in the region, and the corporations and
international financial institutions supporting these projects,
argue that these plans are necessary to develop and integrate
their economies and bring energy and resources to urban centers
- such as the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo. But, critics say
these projects acting as arteries for global trade will have
devastating consequences for Amazonia.
''The mega-projects planned for the Amazon would open up the
heart of the world's largest tropical rainforest to intensive
exploitation,'' says Atossa Soltani, director of the California-
based advocacy group, Amazon Watch - who wa also at the meeting
in Roraima. ''These poects will bring in their wake, a trail of
industrial logging, mining, oil extraction, cattle ranching and
large scale agricultural development.''
Often these projects compound already existing conflicts
indigenous people have with government over land demarcation and
access to natural resources, says Soltani.
The seminar last year brought together representatives of over
35,000 indigenous peoples who live around the Brazil-Venezuela-
Guyana border to discuss common land demarcation problems and
solutions revolving around proposed projects in the region for
the first time.
CIR and the Venezuelan Indigenous Confederation (CONIVE), as
well as the Amerindian Peoples Association (APA) of Guyana are
now calling on the governments to guarantee Indian land rights
and take steps to protect the environment before building a 685
kilometer power line. The proposed line would go from the Guri
hydroelectric dam on the Caroni river in Venezuela to supply
electricity to Boa Vista and the state of Roraima.
As planned, the line would cut though several indigenous areas
in Brazil and Venezuela, as well as the Canaima National Park
that was declared a World Heritage Site by the United
Nations. Because of the line, the Caura and Paragua Rivers may
be redirected through a canal 30 kilometers long which would
flood approximately 500 square kilometers of land inhabited by
16 tribes.
Because the Venezuelan government has not recognized any Indian
land rights, they never consulted people before making these
development plans, says Jose Poyo, president of
CONIVE. Indigenous groups in Venezuela also fear that the line
will lead to processing and manufacturing facilities in the
Amazon as it brings electricity to new gold mining and logging
concessions in the Sierra Imataca Forest Reserve.
In the seminar report, other groups voiced concern about the
paving of the Manaus-Caracas highway - which connects the Amazon
to the Caribbean coast. When the road cut through indigenous
land in the early 1970s about half of the Waimiri-Atroari
Indians died from introduced diseases.
Last year the Waimiri stopped army engineers from paving until
the state government agreed to conduct a full environmental
impact study and provide a 3.5 million dollar grant for the
group to monitor and control traffic on the road for the next
ten years.
In Guyana, the government wants to improve about 450 kilometers
of road from Georgetown to Boa Vista, which would allow timber
and mining companies in the area to increase production. APA is
demanding that all land rights issues be addressed both in
general and in connection with the proposed road
improvements. Land demarcation conflicts between the Amerindian
and the Guyanese government are compounded by the hand out of
extensive logging and mining concessions, says APA.
David James, president of APA, says they are not consulted or
even notified when these concessions are granted. ''To allow
uncontrolled mining and logging in our lands will ultimately
benefit neither Guyana, nor the world, and worst of all it
threatens the survival of the Amerindian people and the
environment.''
The projects brought up at the seminar are just some of the
dozens of proposed infrastructure plans expected to complete the
vision of free trade in the nine countries in the Amazon
basin. In August, groups plan to meet for a second seminar in
Venezuela to further organise against these proposals.
Amazon Watch published a report earlier this year showing that
most of the proposed projects in the region are focussed along
three major corridors: from Manaus in northern Brazil out to the
Caribbean through Guyana and Venezuela; from southern Brazil out
to the Pacific through Bolivia, Chile, and Peru; and from
central Brazil to the Atlantic.
Many Amazonian indigenous groups say they do not know what
projects are being planned until it is too late. ''It's very
hard to get documents about plans for new projects that impact
our area,'' Ann Paulo Souto of CIR told IPS earlier this year.
Documents on such projects were readily available last month at
a U.S. government sponsored conference in Atlanta, Georgia.
At the ''Infrastructure Opportunities in South America,''
conference the U.S. Trade and Development Agency (TDA) promoted
6.4 billion dollars worth of gas production and 8.4 billion
dollars in oil production for Latin American countries.
Some of the projects showcased in Atlanta, including the Camisea
gas fields and pipeline in Peru and the Bolivian-Brazil gas
pipeline, will harm the Amazon rainforest, says Amazon Watch's
Soltani, who protested the conference.
Just days ago, the Inter-American Development Bank approved a
240 million dollar loan to support the construction of the
Bolivia- Brazil pipeline - parts of which will cross fragile
wetlands and subtropical forests.
The Petrozuata heavy crude oil facility in Venezuela's Orinoco
River Basin, and Brazil's Laeado Dam and Tocantin-Araguaia
Watery are other proposed projects promoted by the TDA that
environmental groups say will harm the Amazon.
While the agency does not provide direct funding or loans for
projects, the TDA works closely with the U.S. Overseas Private
Investment Council (OPIC) and the Export-Import Bank - that do
financially encourage U.S. corporations to invest in projects in
other countries.