Chilean Logging Interests Steal Indigenous Birthright
9/13/99
OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY by EE
The notion that outrageous abuse upon indigenous cultures by Western
outsiders is a thing of the past needs to be reconsidered. The same
wanton exploitation, genocide and ecocide practiced throughout the
past 500 years continues apace; particularly where timber, oil and
mineral interests want what indigenous land contains. Following is
an account of the Mapuches of Chile, and their efforts to protect
their ancestral lands from industrial forest "development."
g.b.
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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Industry, `people of earth' clash over land
In Chile, Mapuches say logging interests stole their
birthright
Source: Miami Herald
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: September 6, 1999
Byline: JIMMY LANGMAN
CERRO NIELOL, Chile -- The Mapuches, who for centuries fought back
the Incas and the Spaniards, are fighting again -- this time to
regain some of the land they lost when they made peace with the
republic of Chile in 1881.
The Mapuches, the last indigenous people of the Americas to be
conquered, have tired of eking out a living on small plots of land
while the environment around them deteriorates. Their territory,
which once occupied a quarter of Chile from south of the Bio Bio
river to the island of Chiloe, declined to about 6 percent of their
ancestral holdings with the signing here in Cerro Nielol of ``The
Pacification of Araucania.''
Southern Chile is exploding with Mapuche protests. The Mapuches say
that multinational timber companies have most of their ancestral
land; that they are eliminating native forests, drying up water
sources and poisoning their communities with pesticides.
The region's serene landscape of snow-capped volcanoes, extensive
blue-green lakes and lush temperate rain forest is rapidly being
transformed into plantations of non-native pine and eucalyptus to
feed a growing global appetite for Chilean wood products.
``We Mapuches are the first ecologists on the planet. We want to
return to an ecological equilibrium with nature,'' said Manuel Fren,
the longko, or chief, of Cuyinco, one of the more than 100 Mapuche
communities in direct conflict with timber companies.
``The forest companies contaminate the air and rivers and turn our
land into pine trees to sell to foreigners, and what do we have?
Nothing. We have misery and hunger,'' Fren said.
All this year, groups of Mapuches have been demonstrating by
attacking and burning timber company machinery, blocking roads, or
staging land occupations. Many of their actions have turned into
violent confrontations with large squadrons of Chilean police or with
timber company security guards.
Mapuches have been shot at, beaten, arrested and their homes
ransacked. More than 400 Mapuches have been imprisoned this year.
Mapuches say their communities are under siege by the police, and
that their human rights are being violated.
``There is no doubt the Mapuches are being discriminated against in
Chile within the realm of human rights,'' agrees Cecilia Merino, a
Chilean, who in March began serving as chair of the U.N. Human Rights
Commission. ``The state needs to ensure the possibility of these
people to enjoy their culture, their religion and part of their
culture has to do with the bond they have with the land.''
`People of the earth'
For the nation's one million Mapuches, whose name in their language
means ``people of the earth,'' the lands of southern Chile are
central to their traditions and way of life. In addition to a degree
of political autonomy over their communities, they are demanding the
return of an estimated 50 percent of the land in the region owned by
timber companies, about 1.2 million acres.
For the Chilean government and for forestry companies that have set
up shop in the region, these same lands are an important asset for
economic development. Currently, forestry products are Chile's second
largest export and nearly 90 percent of these exports are derived
from the nation's five million acres of tree plantations.
``On average, each plantation could be valued at about $4,000 per
acre, and . . . each pulp mill is worth about $500 million,'' said
Fernando Raga, vice president of the Chilean Wood Products
Association and general manager of Forestal Minnico, the region's
second-largest land owner.
``This is our land and we will not negotiate. We are not the
counterpart of the Mapuche, we are their neighbors,'' said Raga.
``Land is not their solution; education is.''
The Chilean government is seeking to guarantee the investments of the
timber companies while combating discrimination against Mapuches and
increasing investment in programs to lift the Mapuches out of
poverty.
In early August, President Eduardo Frei announced a three-year, $274
million aid package to go toward a wide range of initiatives such as
construction of new roads and houses, improved health care and
education programs, and technical assistance to Mapuche farms.
Land titles destroyed
On a small scale, the government is helping to return some land to
Mapuche communities whose claims can be backed up by legal
documentation. Under the country's 1992 Indigenous Law, a land fund
was set up which so far has transferred to Mapuches around 185,000
acres. But most legal titles were destroyed by the military
dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, says Jacques Choncol, former
minister of agriculture during the 1970-73 Salvador Allende
government.
``We gave to the Mapuches 740,000 acres as a historical reparation in
our agrarian reform program, but the Pinochet government took the
land back and sold it to the forest companies at low prices. And
after that the Pinochet government subsidized 90 percent of the costs
of the tree plantations,'' said Choncol.
Leaders of the Mapuches vow their demonstrations will continue as
long as the government's proposals to solve their land claims remain
inadequate.
``The forestry companies have most of our land, but they have made a
mistake by not negotiating with Mapuche communities. If there is no
solution to our land claims, there is no possibility to end this
conflict,'' said Aucan Huilcaman, leader of the Mapuche group Council
of All Lands.
``Eco-cide is happening in Mapuche territory,'' said Huilcaman. ``The
foreign investors and NAFTA also need to be aware that this territory
is in the process of restitution and this process is irreversible. We
are asking for our territory, self-determination, and a new relation
with the state of Chile.''
Copyright 1999 Miami Herald