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FOREST
CONSERVATION NEWS TODAY
Mining
Companies Invade Peru's Andean Cloud Forests
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Forest
Networking a Project of Forests.org, Inc.
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Conservation Links
08/18/01
OVERVIEW
& COMMENTARY by Forests.org
Some of
the most ecologically important rainforests in the World,
Peru's
high montane cloud forests and paramo ecosystems, are to be
devastated
by widespread mining. A proposed mining
project in Piura
state
by Manhattan mining company of Canada and other companies would
disrupt
a fruit and carob bean producing agrarian society and highly
sensitive
cloud forest ecosystems. The scale of
the mining
activities
would be massive and cause irreparable ecological impact
for
short-term enrichment of urban elite.
These
unique cloud forest ecosystems provide much of Peru's water.
Cloud
forests are a natural aquifer - absorbing, filtering,
purifying,
and equitably and dependably distributing pure water. In
addition,
this area contains rare and endangered animals such as the
mountain
tapir, Tapirus pinchaque, a large mammalian herbivore.
Tapirs
act as seed dispersers - helping maintain the flora of
mountains
of the northern Andes, some of the ecologically richest
rainforests
in the World.
Due to
violence against environmentalists, an anonymous local
conservationist
is quoted in the article below as saying: "For a
short
term profit to obliterate these areas is very unwise, so much
of Peru
is becoming desertified due to overgrazing and forest
destruction. There are only precious tiny remnants left
for the
mountain
tapir and water and the quality of life."
In
return for vague promises of economic development that are
unlikely
to be fulfilled and will not last; these priceless
ecosystems,
watersheds and sustainable economies are to be lost
forever. Another anonymous source notes "disruption
and
environmental
contamination of water, air, and soil that will result
from
these open pit mines, their process stores, their fumes, and
their
leachates, are inimical to all forms of living creatures and
their
anciently evolved, intricately interrelated ecosystem."
Forests.org
concurs. Industrial development of
rainforests is an
evil,
global scourge that threatens all humans know, love and need.
Commercial
activities that destroy or diminish intact natural
rainforests
must be willed out of existence.
g.b.
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RELAYED
TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Mining Companies Invade Peru's Andean Cloud
Forests
Source: c Environment News Service (ENS) 2001
Date: August 17, 2001
PIURA,
Peru, August 17, 2001 (ENS) - The recent discovery of gold
deposits
in northwestern Peru has split the population between those
who
support proposed mineral extraction and those who fear it will
cause
irreparable ecological damage to human health, agriculture and
endangered
species.
The
minerals have been discovered in the agrarian valley of the Tambo
Grande
district, Piura state, and its surrounding dry tropical
forests,
part of the lower Piura River basin.
Local
residents and conservationists fear the effects of exploration
and
mining activities by Manhattan Minerals Corp. of Vancouver,
British
Columbia, Canada and 11 other Peruvian, Canadian, Australian
and
Argentinian mining firms.
Considerable
local protest has been manifested, and violence has
broken
out between mining supporters and fruit producing citizens who
see
their watersheds threatened with deforestation and contamination.
In
February, the Manhattan Minerals project facilities near the town
of
Tambo Grande were vandalized. Calling the perpetrators
"politically
motivated," the company said, "The actions of the group
are not
representative of the majority of the townspeople, who have
strongly
supported Manhattan's efforts to bring environmentally sound
economic
development to the area."
The
companies have already done mineral exploration in the
mountainous
nature reserves of Piura, according to a local former
mining
engineer. In addition to gold and silver, copper and zinc have
been
found. "These companies are waiting for Manhattan to commence
Piura's
ecological destruction, then they will follow suit," he
predicts.
Other
mining companies poised to exploit northern Peru are: Canadian
firms
AngloGold, Newmont, Minera Britannia Gold, and Redmond Ventures
Corp.;
Peruvian companies Buenaventura, Mineria Urumalqui, Minero
Peru,
Sur Mineria Peruana, and Cedemin; as well as Mineria North S.A.
of
Australia, and Minera Argento of Argentina.
These
companies have claimed extensive concessions in the northern
Peruvian
districts of Ayabaca, Sullana, Piura, as well as Tambo
Grande.
They have already proved the ore samples from their
explorations
and await the final government decisions under the new
Peruvian
President Alejandro Toledo, the nation's first elected
indigenous
president.
Thousands
of people have in recent months taken to the streets of
Sullana,
Piura, and other cities and towns to demand the cancellation
of the
mining concessions permits, permits that had received support
from
the now discredited regime of former President Alberto Fujimori.
Critics
say the proposed mines would dislocate local communities, and
destroy
the region's fruit and carob bean industry and its vegetable
fields.
Conservationists fear the scale of the mining activities
would
be "overwhelming, causing irreparable ecological impact."
The
first open pit mine to be allowed in Piura would release large
amounts
of dust into the strong winds of the area, warned a source
who
asked not to be identified. The mines would be situated roughly
60
miles inland of South America's Pacific coast - a region which
first
feels the effects of the cyclical El Nino and La Nina eastern
tropical
Pacific weather patterns.
Scientists
working for the preservation of these unique cloud forest
ecosystems
say water is more precious than anything.
Another
source who asked not to be named, said, "For a short term
profit
to obliterate these areas is very unwise, so much of Peru is
becoming
desertified due to overgrazing and forest destruction. There
are
only precious tiny remnants left for the mountain tapir and water
and the
quality of life."
When
sources of information for this article ask not to be named,
they
are likely recalling the March 31 death of agricultural engineer
Godofredo
Garcia Baca, a campaigner for environmental causes who
opposed
mining proposals in the Piura region.
Baca,
the former executive director of the Special Project for Chira-
Piura
and assessor of the Municipality of Chulucana, was shot while
driving
to his small farm in Somate Bajo, greater Sullana, local
newspapers
reported.
Driving
his truck accompanied by his son Ulises, Baca was shot in the
chest
by a hooded boy who ambushed him alongside an irrigation canal.
Ulises
told reporters he believes the killing was well planned and
deliberate.
A long
time naturalist guide in the area, who asked to remain
anonymous,
says Baca was murdered. "Myself, I have eluded two
attempts
on my life. Still I have not completed my personal
investigation
of the murder and the attempts in order to determine
who
is/are behind this." He suspects a connection with two of the
mining
companies, but does not have enough information to charge
anyone.
"I also know that other regional ecologists have been
threatened,"
he says. To date no conservationists other than Baca
have
been killed.
Roughly
600,000 hectares (1.5 million acres) of the Piura region,
about
60 miles inland of the Pacific Ocean, have been claimed by the
transnational
mining companies. Manhattan Minerals plans to exploit
gold
bearing ores in the Valley of San Lorenzo, extracting out of
what
would be the first open pit operation in the town of Tambo
Grande.
Nearly
all of this proposed area is a populated agricultural region.
The
inhabitants of these agrarian lands do not welcome the mining
exploitation.
But business people from Peru's capital city, Lima, see
an
opportunity to become rich, so support the foreigners who come
bearing
mining wealth.
Manhattan
has claimed 87,000 hectares in 97 concessions in the area.
By
comparison, the cultivated region of Tambo Grande is 50,000
hectares.
The mining concession includes 27 percent of the carob
bean,
or algorroba, forest of Piura state, an economically important,
healthful
and ecologically compatible agricultural product. Carob
beans
become a chocolate substitute in products for the health
food
market worldwide.
Oil
exploration is coming into Piura state hand in hand with mining
development.
Members of the Piura based NGO Pro-Norte Peru are
alarmed
that near the neighboring town of Sullana an allocation for
petroleum
has been given to Argentina-Pluspetrol Company.
This
area is inhabited by rare and endangered animals such as
tigrillos,
jaguars, pumas, mountain lions, crested ducks, and
pelicans,
nutria and crocodiles. All are listed as threatened or
endangered
by the IUCN - World Conservation Union and most are also
listed
by the government of Peru.
Concerned
that the World Bank might be funding these industrial
activities
in northern Peru, Craig Downer of Minden, Nevada who is
president
of the Andean Tapir Fund and a member of the IUCN SSC Tapir
Specialist
Group, wrote this month to World Bank executives in
Washington,
DC, and Peru. "I am quite disturbed to learn of a mining
project
in the area of Tambo Grande and involving the highland
cloud
forests and paramos of the Cordillera de las Lagunillas along
Ecuador's
southern border. This project involves the Manhattan mining
company
and other Canadian companies and would disrupt a fruit and
carob
bean producing agrarian society."
The
Manhattan mining Corporation is not a World Bank Group sponsored
project,
replied Juan Blazquez, who is with Knowledge Management &
Information
Services, Environmentally & Socially Sustainable
Development
Network, at the World Bank's Washington, DC headquarters.
Graham
Clow, president of Manhattan Mining, says, "We have conducted
preliminary
exploration over only a portion of our ground and we are
presently
reviewing our exploration program with the objective of
becoming
more aggressive." Two new "massive" deposits have been
discovered
this year in the Tambo Grande area, and the potential for
recovering
valuable gold and silver is "much larger" than the
company's
limited explorations have found to date.
"The
size and strength of the district is obvious," said Clow. "The
TG-1
gold/silver deposit will produce gold at one of the lowest cash
costs
in the industry and is only the start of what should develop
into a
long-term mining district."
Clow
says the company is working with the local people to win them
over to
the companies' mining proposals. "We continue to work closely
with the
people of the community of Tambo Grande and the surrounding
areas.
Work continues on town planning and the design of new housing.
Our
communications and consultation programs with the people are
designed
to demonstrate that a potential long-term mining operation
can be
developed in a sustainable manner, compatible with the very
important
agricultural base of the region."
Local
critics say the mining companies are "taking in" a lot of
people
in Tambo Grande with promises of money and minimizing the
ecological
impact it will cause.
One
scientist says, "Politics play in decisions like this, people
that
are not so sophisticated, used to working in the fields, there
are
politicians that will promise them almost anything, but it's what
happens
afterwards, if they undermine their watersheds and pollute
them,
in the long term they will curse these people for deceiving
them."
Another
critic sees that if a large-scale mining project in Piura is
established,
it will not be limited to only one mining company with
only
three open mines in a district, but will lead to many such open
mines
over a very large portion of Piura state.
"The
earth disruption and environmental contamination of water, air,
and
soil that will result from these open pit mines, their process
stores,
their fumes, and their leachates, are inimical to all forms
of
living creatures and their anciently evolved, intricately
interrelated
ecosystem," he says.
The
Environmental Impact Statement for the projects, by Manhattan and
Pluspetrol,
do not mention endangered or threatened species.
Independent
scientists have located occupied habitats for these
species
throughout northern Peru and many fall within the areas
claimed
by the mining companies Manhattan, Anglo Gold, and
Buenaventura.
The
fragile harmony around the Northwestern Biosphere Reserve will be
disrupted,
critics predict. The mining company Western Atlas has
already
penetrated several times within the Biosphere Reserve,
disrupting
endangered birds and animals. The authorities do not
appear
to be concerned.
Mineral
explorations and claims have penetrated into the very
headwaters
of the Quiroz River in the high cloud forests and paramos
around
the frontier garrison town of Ayabaca. All they await is the
final
government decision respecting the Tambo Grande mine, before
what
conservationists see as violations of Piura's last nature
reserves
and highland source aquifers will take place.
These
aquifers absorb, filter, purify, and equitably distribute pure
water
to all life downslope during all seasons of the year. "They
constitute
a natural value and service whose despoliation we Piurans
simply
cannot allow!" said one man.
"The
magical heights around Ayabaca and including especially the
Cordillera
de las Lagunillas constitute one of a dozen or so
sanctuaries
for the intriguing mountain tapir, Tapirus pinchaque, a
large
mammalian herbivore," one scientist said. The tapir acts as a
seed
disperser in the northern Andes mountains where it evolved along
with
the rise of the mountane cloud forests and paramo ecosystems
during
the past three million years since its forebears migrated to
Peru
from Central America.
The
mountain, or Andean, tapir is seriously threatened with
extinction
due to habitat destruction and hunting. It is classified
as
fully endangered with extinction by the World Conservation Union
Species
Survival Commission Tapir Specialist Group. There are
estimated
to be fewer than 200 of these mountaineering animals
surviving
Peru today and 2,500 in the northern Andes, including
fragmented
populations in Ecuador and Colombia.
But the
mining corporations are moving ahead with their plans for
mineral
extraction from beneath these cloud forests. On June 27,
Manhattan
Minerals Corp. announced that Cedimin, a wholly owned
subsidiary
of the Buenaventura Group has granted a 15 month extension
to
Manhattan's Option Agreement on the Papayo Concessions to January
15,
2004. The area contains the intersection of two mineral bearing
deposits,
and the extension is the latest in a series of extensions
granted
over the past year.
Proclaiming
substantial employment opportunities, Manhattan would
employ
a about 600 Peruvians for the relatively short term life of
the
project, estimated at between three and 15 years, depending on
which
mining site is being worked.
A forum
for stakeholder dialogue has been established in the hope
that
talk will defuse the anger. On May 2, the Minister of Energy and
Mines
for Peru, Carlos Herrera Descalzi, the Archbishop of the
Diocese
of Piura and Tumbes, Monsignor Oscar Cantuarias Pastor, the
leaders
of the Front of Defense of Tambogrande, and Manhattan Mining
endorsed
a document that will establish the mechanism to inform the
people
of Tambo Grande and the surrounding area as to the specific
details
of the Environmental Impact Study and town relocation
process.
The
Minister of Energy and Mines, Carlos Herrera Descalzi, that day
opened
the first Reconciliation Board Meeting to discuss the
Tambogrande
Mining Project. He said the process has been set up so
that,
"by means of dialogue, the people of this district have a
better
awareness of the project before adopting any decision over
whether
they accept its execution, or not."
The
process of consultation will be led by the government. The
Minister
of Agriculture and elected representatives of the town of
Tambogrande
will be invited to join the discussions.
The final
decision, Herrera indicated, would be taken by the people,
but
will have to wait for the conclusion of ongoing studies, he said,
so that
they might be aware of all details of the project before any
decision
is made.
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