Brazil Seeks to Limit Settler Damage to Rainforest

***********************************************

WORLDWIDE FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS

***********************************************

Forest Networking a Project of Ecological Enterprises

http://forests.org/

3/22/98

OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY by EE

As reported previously, Brazil has unveiled new policies to address

continued Amazonian deforestation. They have chosen to focus on the

role of settlers. An equally pointed response is necessary to address

illegal logging which continues to flourish.

g.b.

*******************************

RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:

Title: Brazil Seeks to Limit Settler Damage to Rainforest

Source: Reuters

Date: March 19, 1998

Byline: William Schomberg

BRASILIA, March 19 (Reuters) - Brazil, struggling against raging

forest fires in the Amazon, unveiled on Thursday measures officials

said would reduce the impact of land-hungry settlers on the

rainforest.

``Land policy and environmental policy must flow in the same

direction,'' said Environment Minister Gustavo Krause.

Fires started by poor subsistence farmers, many of them settlers, have

raged out of control for two months in a vast savannah region of

Roraima state, on Brazil's border with Venezuela. The fires are now

advancing into the rainforest.

Environmentalists say small-scale farmers, with their primitive slash-

and-burn techniques, are a major driving force behind deforestation in

the Amazon region.

``We can't put the blame on one factor or another but within the

general universe of causes, the small farmers definitely contribute,''

said Eduardo Martins, president of the government's Environment

Institute (IBAMA).

Thursday's package of measures included settling landless families in

areas of the Amazon which have been deforested.

An estimated 230,000 square miles (600,000 square km), an area bigger

than France, has been already been chopped down and 77,200 square

miles (200,000 square km) of that total is idle.

Brazil's military dictatorship began settling the Amazon in the 1960s

in a bid to populate the remote, Western Europe-sized rainforest. Many

settlers continue to be sent to jungle areas which are quickly

destroyed.

In a bid to slow land invasions by landless groups in the Amazon

region, another measure will rule out including in the government's

land reform program forested areas which have been invaded by landless

farmers.

The government will suspend distribution of land deeds for new

settlements over 247 acres (100 hectares) in the Amazon and scrap land

reform rules that encourage land owners to cut down trees.

Martins said that the new measures would be easy to introduce,

requiring only administrative changes, and added that they would be

backed up by funds and training.

Brazil has taken several steps in recent months to reduce

deforestation in the Amazon region. In January, Congress approved a

new law to make it easier for authorities to prosecute environmental

offenders including logging companies.

In January it announced that an area equivalent to twice the size of

Belgium was deforested between 1995 and 1997, with most of the damage

taking place in 1995.

###RELAYED TEXT ENDS###

This document is a PHOTOCOPY for educational, personal and non-

commercial use only. Recipients should seek permission from the

source for reprinting. All efforts are made to provide accurate,

timely pieces; though ultimate responsibility for verifying all

information rests with the reader. Check out our Gaia Forest

Conservation Archives at URL= http://forests.org/

Networked by Ecological Enterprises, gbarry@forests.org