Small farmers are removed from their properties by
assassins hired by large landowners, most of which belong to the infamous
Uniao Democratica Ruralista (UDR). Such violence compels
landless families, Os Sem Terra, to flee to Brazilian
urban areas, but high inflation (735% in 1975) prevents the poor from
securing employment, housing, and food. Families return to the countryside
to find unclaimed land on which they can grow their pao de cada dia
-- daily bread. Audacious civil protest in the form of peasant land invasions
is galvanized by the lack of political support the landless poor
receive from the government and the political awakening of civil
society regarding human rights.
|
FACT |
|
In 1990 radars indicated that some 10 percent of the Amazon selva had
been cleared for cattle pasture, crops, lumber, and firewood. |
2.1. Ranchers, The Main Culprits of Amazon Deforestation
Ranchers, best characterized as predatory occupants of the Amazon, rushed
into the rain forest to grab as much land as they possibly could under
the government's law which declared ownership to the individual who cleared
the land and put it to effective use. It is the ranchers who are responsible
for clearing large tracts of land. Not less than 23 of the 28 largest landowners
in Brazil have their immense estates in the Amazon region covering more
than 60 million acres. (Hecht, 168)
2.1.a The Land Statute of 1964
In 1964, under Brazilian land law, there was a provision which supported
ownership of the land by the one who cultivated it or produced on it. If
a person could demonstrate 'effective use' which meant cultivation for
a year and a day, then that person could claim the holding or posse.
(Hecht and Cockburn, 168)
The way the government defined 'effective use' resulted in the following:
(1) clearing enormous areas of forest for cattle production
(2) displacing forest dwellers of all kinds
(3) creating cattle pastures which lost productive capacity in less
than ten (10) years.
Such a loosely defined law led to wide-spread deforestation of the
Amazon.
Another law in 1980, gave squatters the right to possess or claim land
on which they had lived and kept production for 5 years. They legally claim
rights to possession-- direito de posse. (Hecht and Cockburn, 168)
2.1.b Fierce Land-Grabbing by Fazendeiros, Latifundistas,
Grileiros
Obviously the government engineered its laws to encourage settlement
and development of the Amazon. The state government of Mato Grosso actually
managed to issue 12 million acres in land titles more than the state size!
(Hecht and Cockburn, 168) In the state of Para, bribing the mayors, police,
lawyers and judges was commonplace. Those who could not obtain titles made
their own. (Hecht and Cockburn, 168) Brazil is rife with landowners with
false titles to land. As for law in the Amazonia, many remark that the
only law in Amazon is the "law of the jungle" where the strongest and most
powerful reign.
Untold numbers of small landholders, or posseiros, lost their acres
subsequent to threats or violence by large landowners. Evidence of land
claims and rightful ownership went up in smoke as government land offices,
were commonly set on fire. (Hecht and Cockburn, 168)
Gaining control over large areas of land was pivotal to securing credit
from the government and other agencies, as well as profiting from land
speculation. Starting ranches was the easiest and fastest way to comply
with the 'effective use' requirement of Brazilian law and simultaneously
grab vast areas of land.
In another example, the state of Acre saw frenzied land speculation
between 1972 to 1976. Prior to 1972, the rubber industry was at an all
time low, land was real cheap, and yet road projects were under development.
(Hecht and Cockburn, 168) This scenario has been characterized as a land
speculator's dream. During that 4-year period land prices in Acre increased
1,000 to 2,000%. More than a third of the state, nearly 12 million acres,
changed hands. (Hecht and Cockburn, 170) While 18,500 acres (81 titles)
were registered by the lands office, the remaining 11, 981,500 acres were
unaccounted for. Patterns of corruption veiled as "negligence" illustrated
in Acre state are rampant in Brazil. (Hecht and Cockburn, 170)
Such frenzied land-grabbing has resulted in 85% of the occupied lands
in the Amazon being devoted to cattle grazing. A close look at the numbers,
however, indicate that the 'cost of raising cattle were barely met by their
selling price'. (Hecht and Cockburn, 169) So, what is driving cattle ranchers
to invest? --tax breaks, subsidies, and fat profits resulting from the
sell of portions of their huge estates.
The destruction of the Amazon rain forest is entirely absurd when juxtaposed
next to the fact that pastures become unsustainable after less than 10
years. By 1990, more than 50% of all the cleared areas were abandoned.
When the forest is cleared for pasture many nutrients are released into
the soil, but quickly those nutrients diminish. The nutritional value of
the grass itself is reduced, until only shrub-like weeds grow. Soils finally
become so compacted that cattle cannot graze in the pastures. New land
is subsequently cleared and the cycle begins only to restart in less than
ten (10) years.
2.2 The Landless: Victims of Rural Violence, Migration, and Poverty
Scores of Brazilians die of hunger and land-related murders every year.
Why? When there are 250 million hectares of unproductive or uncultivated
land in Brazil? Poor Brazilians' exodus into the Amazon rain forest
is explained by the following realities existent in Brazil:
2.2.a One major reason is that large landowners
are ranchers, and do not use the millions of hectares they own for food
production. The herds of cattle they raise do not graze on a significant
portion of their land, so much of their land lie fallow unproductive. If
production does occur on a small portion of their land it is for export
crops such as soybeans, coffee, or sugarcane.
Ironically, it is the small producers with land less than 100 hectares
that produce 80% of Brazil's food. These same producers own only 12% of
the land in Brazil.
2.2.b The large landowners or ranchers (fazendeiros) are
a politically powerful force in Brazil. Many are congressmen, senators,
as well as businessmen. A well organized constituency of ranchers formed
the Uniao Democratica Ruralista (UDR) to plan and promote their agenda
in the country. In 1987 the leader of UDR, Salvador Farinha, basically
pronounced war in the countryside to defendranchers land practices.:
Declaration by UDR leader
|
Quote |
| UDR |
"Today I think that we can confess that yes, we bought weapons with
the money from the cattle auctions. After the first, in Goinania [Goias]
we bought 1, 636 guns. Today we have more than 70,000, one for every man
in the Uniao Democratica Ruralista, men who decided to stop being left
out of our country's history." (Hecht and Cockburn, 180) |
2.2.c The government of Brazil returned to civilian
government in 1985 after 21 years of military rule. From 1987-88 a new
constitution was drafted under President Sarney. Brazil held its first
direct elections for President in 1989 which indicates the low degree of
participation citizens historically were accustomed to having in the country.
Certainly the interests of the landless or the small farmer paled compared
to that of latifundistas.
Given the political landscape, it has been near impossible to achieve
a substantive Land Reform, or an equitable redistribution of land into
the hands of the landless who will produce food, and reduce the hunger
of fellow Brazilians.
2.2.d Most ranchers finance their own militia to
protect their property and hijack land of nearby small farmers. Many gunmen,
called pistoleiros are hired to set a farm on fire, kill a farmer's
domesticated animals and pets, to contaminate wells or water supplies in
order to scare a title-holding landowner away. When the various forms of
intimidation fail, farmers and their families are critically wounded and
often killed. Violence Against Peasants
Priest Murdered for Agrarian Reform Advocacy
|
Violence Against The Church |
Mother holds up the shirt of her son, a priest, Father
Josimo Tavares, gunned down because he advocated Land Reform and Justice.
State Police made no attempt to investigate the first attempted murder
on his life. A delegation of Bishops took the issue of violence against
rural peasants and church workers to Federal authorities in Brasilia in
July 1986. On April 20, 1988 a jury found one of the hitmen guilty, the
other four allegedly escaped police.
|
2.3. The ineffectiveness of the government's land reform
policies and enforcement of the meager demands made on large fazendeiros,
has left the Landless with no choice than to join together in civil protest.
The Landless People's Movement (O Movimento Dos Sem Terra in Portuguese)
is supported vigorously by the Catholic Church. Lawyers, economists, agronomists,
nuns, pastors, priests and lay church members work as activists to bring
legal support, organization, research, and spiritual encouragement to the
masses of poor people in search of land rights. One of the main groups
leading the way is the Church Commission for Land-- Commissao Pastoral
da Terra (CPT).
One of the movement's most effective tools for getting the government's
attention is the invasion of latifundios. Hundreds of rural peasants pitch
tents on the unproductive land of a latifundista or fazendeiro.
Often the government sends out troops to terminate the invasion. Too many
times the state officials side with large landowners. Albeit rarely, some
large landowners have been given ultimatums by the government to
either use the land or give it up for redistribution.
Under President Sarney, the Agrarian Reform policy in the new constitution
targeted the settlement of 450,000 peasants on farmland by the year 2000.
It is also important to note that in 1988 that the appointed Minister of
Agrarian Reform was killed in an airplane crash.
Movimento Sem Terra/The Landless People's
Movement
|
Land Invasion by the Hundreds |
"Agrarian Reform won't come if the rural worker just sits waiting for it.
Days ago I went to INCRA with a negotiating committee. There I encountered
persons, seriously filling out registration cards in order to obtain land,
I thought to myself: They had better wait sitting down because they will
never be called." (interviews with landless in Sem Terra, 1987,
p.81)
|
The environmental degradation of the rain forest cannot and should not
be disconnected from the injustice that propels the poor into the unclaimed
selva of the Amazon. The deforestation of the Amazon is reported to have
begun in 1960 in Mato Grosso. During the 1970's and 1980's deforestation
continued into the states of Rondonia and Acre.
Below is a picture of a farmer who moved to Rondonia in search of better
living conditions, access to land, and peace.
He, along with hundreds of other landless farmers ,migrated to Rondonia
for survival. For three years Jacinto Louis Stedeli worked to clear 135
acres, cutting 49 trees each days with his chain saw. He cleared land for
crops by himself. He expected the quality of life for his family to improve
in the Amazon and so he left his low wage employment in a factory in Parana.
(Ellis, 792)
2.4 Loggers
Another group responsible for deforestation is the loggers. Felling trees
for the timber trade have resulted in ecological damage as well as conflict
with indians, rubber tappers and posseiros. There are an estimated 700
species of wood considered appropriate for hardwood export. The timber
trade focuses, however, on basically 20 different species. Some of the
most well know wood-types are cherry, mahogany, and sandalwood. (Hecht
and Cockburn, 158)
When loggers move into rain forest territory approximately 3% of the
trees are destroyed by the road construction. About 52% of the remaining
trees are damaged or killed by the logging operations. (Hecht and Cockburn,
158) Only the best trees are selected by loggers and the impact on the
environment is very undesirable. Such clearing, makes the forest more fire
prone and reduces the healthiness of the forest when the genetically superior
trees are removed. (Hecht and Cockburn, 158)
Conflicts occur when loggers trespass on indian reservations to obtain
the best hardwood. Many loggers and indians have been killed as a result
of greed and illegal incursions upon the reserves. The National Foundation
for the Indian (FUNAI) has been repeatedly accused of negotiating unfair
contracts between logging companies and indians for trees. After a FUNAI-negotiated
contract, indians would discover through grassroots advocacy groups that
an unfair price, say $50/tree, was paid when the market commands $350/tree.
It is believed that the assassins were hired by timber dealers to get
rid of Tukuna Indians that resisted them. (Ellis, 792). Fourteen Tukuna
Indians were killed on March 30, 1988 near the town of Benjamin Constant
in the state of Amazonas. Amnesty International followed the case and discovered
that federal competence for the case was rejected. The courts also determined
that police inquiry was incomplete. (Amnesty, 78-79). Violence
against Indians
2.5 Gold Miners
Not only has the mining industry brought conflict to the Amazon, but it
has brought contamination. Prospectors or garimpeiros use mercury to extract
gold or tin from mining areas. Mercurial poisoning puts not only miners
at risk, but any living creature exposed to the heavy metal in water or
vapors. The use of mercury in water means that entire tributaries of the
Amazon are poisoned. The Xingu, Araguia, and Tocantins rivers are expected
to be seriously effected by the mining zones in which they located. (Hecht
and Cockburn, 163) Fish and plants eaten with mercury poses lethal consequences
for humans at the end of the food chain. Symptoms of mercury toxicity are
irritability, difficulty in hearing, kidney problems, insomnia, loss of
memory-- all things that could be misdiagnosed as malaria or any common
illness. (Hecht and Cockburn, 162) Mercury, even in small doses, is poisonous
because it accumulates in central nervous system and eventually causes
insanity. The intrigues of the gold mines of the Amazon particularly astonishing.
The majority of the miners are between ages 15 and 25. (Hecht and Cockburn,
165) Garimpeiros attack one another, slit the air tubes of other divers,
rob one another, etc. The life of the garimpeiro, however, is a very difficult
one and often is complimented with other economic extraction activities
such as Brazil nut collection, rubber tapping, and farming.
Conflict with indigenous populations arise because so many gold deposits
are located on the indian reserves. In 1990 there were 26 gold mines on
native lands. (Hecht and Cockburn, 160) Many are clandestine. The largest
of these mines, the Cumaru mine in the Gorotire Kayapo reserve, was invaded
by 100,000 garimpeiros in 1980. When FUNAI was asked by the tribes to intervene,
a 10% royalty was negotiated. (Hecht and Cockburn, 160)
The Indian Statute or Law 6001 made access to mineral wealth in indian
territory legal . Reserves were considered federal lands. Later, Article
231 of the new constitution stipulated that extraction from indian reserves
would be allowed only "by an act of Congress, and assured Indians royalties
from these activities." (Hecht and Cockburn, 155)
2.6 Infrastructure Development
The World Bank was responsible for providing the loans needed to construct
the main transport artery into the rain forest. The highway was a major
feature of the Polonoroeste Development Project promoted by the Brazilian
government. (Ellis, 786) The 900-mile highway linking Cuiaba, Mato Grosso
with the port city of Porto Velho, Rondonia, known as BR-364, was a significant
factor in the migration of Brazilians into the Amazon rain forest. Highway
BR-364 was completed in 1984. The highway for many years unpaved, facilitated
the waves of people entering the forest with the prospect of finding farmland,
gold, tapping rubber trees, etc. When the road was paved migration levels
increased drastically.
Highway construction meant the destruction of thousands of species of
trees, known and unknown. About 7,376 miles of highway were constructed
by 1960, but by 1984 there were 15,365 miles of highway in the Amazon.
(Hecht and Cockburn, 157)
Aerial View of BR-429, an offshoot of BR-364
Nature was not the only thing devastated, but so were the indigenous
forest dwellers: "with the development of BR-364 and the opening up of
areas in the Guarpore valley, the Nambiquara (Indians) so admired by Levi
Strauss and numbering close to 20,000 at the beginning of the century,
were reduced to 650 discouraged souls." (Hecht and Cockburn, 157) In the
Yamnomu Indian territory, the population was reduced 25% after contact
with road crews. (Hecht and Cockburn, 157) Indians' exposure to European
diseases such as measles and chicken pox have wiped out many tribes. Health
posts manned by FUNAI workers are under supplied and often unable to reverse
these illnesses.
3. Location
Domain: Latin America
Site: Latin America Amazon Tropical Forest
Impact: Brazil
The Amazon rain forest is the world's richest and most varied biological
reservoir, containing millions of species of insects, plants, birds, and
other forms of life, many still unrecorded by science. The Amazon Basin
covers an area of 2,300,000 sq. miles representing 40% of Brazil's total
area. The Amazon river is the largest basin river in the world stretching
from the Atlantic ocean in the east to the tree line of the Andes Mountain
range in the west. (Britannica 1995, 314). The rain forest reaches into
the states of Acre, Amapa, Amazonas, Maranhao, Mato Grosso, Para, ,
and Roraima.
return to Identification, Conflict
Environment Dimension, Related Materials
II. CONFLICT & ENVIRONMENT DIMENSION
4. Type and Level of Conflict: Civil and Low
Based on the categorization of the cases in this database, the violence
related to land tenure in Brazil, is characterized as sporadic civil
conflict, involving widespread human rights violations. War, as traditionally
viewed, is not the nature of the conflict, yet, the suffering, expulsion,
and death of so many people persist day after day.
4.1 Killing with Impunity in the Amazon
4.1.aViolence against Indians.
It is
estimated that more than one-third of the Indians extant in 1900 have passed
from this earth. (Hecht and Cockburn, ) A Brazilian anthropologist Darcy
Ribeira published demonstrated that between 1900 and 1957 some 80 tribes
have been destroyed. (Hecht and Cockburn, 153) The indigenous population
had been reduced from 1 million to 200,000. In the 1960's, a 21-volume
document produced by Attorney General Jader Figueiredo was published to
recount an investigation into the death of so many indians. Figueiredo
discovered that entire tribes had been destroyed by dynamite, machine guns,
and poisoned sugar. (Hecht and Cockburn, 154) Later investigations by a
French medical attaché found that between 1957 and 1963 tribes in
Mato Grosso had been deliberately infected with tuberculosis. (Hecht and
Cockburn, 154) This happened again in 1964 and 1965. (Hecht and Cockburn,
154)
Just as horrifying are the countless indictments against the very government
agency set up to protect indigenous people's rights. The Indian Protection
Service (SPI) had perpetrated the rapes, beatings and deaths of many Indians,
as well as corroborated with large-scale landowners to negotiate unfair
prices for wood from reservations.
It is generally known that Indians only kill when their space is invaded.
Officials estimated in 1988 that only 15-20 outsiders had been killed by
indians. (Ellis, 792) In an interview with National Geographic journalists
a representative of the Conselho Indigenista Missionario (CIMI) that works
as advocates rights for indigenous peoples, asserted that, "There were
organized raids to kill indians and get their lands ...whole villages have
been wiped out. Members of the Zoro tribe, for example, were pushed around
and killed by thugs from the town of Ji-Parana in order to consolidate
land for one big rancher." (Ellis, 792)
4.2 Violence against Peasants.
In 1987 Amnesty International Report on Human Rights violations in Brasil
set out to delineate
-
Authorized violences in rural Brazil
-
Official tolerance of deliberate killings of peasants and their advisors
-
Persistent obstruction of inquiries into these killings
-
Hundreds of arbitrary detensions
Hundreds of rural farmers and workers have been shot at gun point, en masse
and ambushed by gunmen hired by landowners. It is common for the military
state police to be directly responsible for the assissinations of peasant
activists and small landowners. Farmers under threat have little recourse
to justice or protection once they become targets of these hitmen.
In April 1997, Amnesty International reported a case among many in which
1,500 peasants were fired on by milatry police during a demonstration for
agrarian reform in Para State. The protesters were blocking a roadway
in Eldorado do Carajas and in response to the gun fire they threw stones
and farm tools at the police.
Consistent with reports in other cases, the military police targeted
certain individuals for extrajudicial execution. Nineteen peasants
were murdered and sixty were wounded. Most were shot in the head,
two at close range and seven were lacerated (tortured) to death by their
own farm implements.
Such killings are heinous and innumerous in Brazil.
A case brought to court for the 1995 killing of ten peasants in Corumbiara
was settled in October 1977 and 22 military police were found guilty for
the murder of these civilians in Rondonia. The federal government and the
state courts usually acquit these police when evidence points to their
involvement in extrajudicial executions. Often evidence is destroyed. As
a result military police-backed death squads act with impunity throughout
Brazil. (Amnesty Int'l Report 1997: Brazil) Related
Websites/literature.
Violence in the Rural Areas
|
| Indicators |
In 1984 |
In 1985 |
1994-1995 |
| Number of Conflicts |
438 |
|
577 |
|
?? |
|
| Farmers Impacted |
332,866 |
|
567,324 |
|
48,391 |
|
| Persons Assassinated |
116 |
|
216 |
|
86 |
|
Source: Reforma Agraria, Porque?, Associacao Brasileira
de Reforma Agraria and Jose Pereira da Silva, consultant with the Instituto
de Estudos Socio-Economicos, 1986, p4. 1994-95 information from http://www.sedos.org/
english/mark.htm. The document is a report written by Mark
S. Langevin and Peter Rosset.
4.3 Violence against Advocacy Workers.
The land conflict in rural Brazil escalated in the mid-1980's when President
Sarney announced pans for an agrarian reform. In 1985 the National Plan
for Land Reform was decreed for 7 million hectares to be redistributed
by the year 2000. In 1987, 200 death threats were reported to the Ministry
of Agrarian Reform and Development (MIRAD) and in turn were sent to the
Ministry of Justice. In case after case no official action was taken to
(1) discover who was responsible for the threats (2) act against
them when their identities were known, or (3) protect those receiving threats.
Among the many people assassinated for land:
Top: [1] Sister Adelaide Mozinari, of the
Congregation of Daughters of Divine Love, was murdered on April 14, 1985
in Eldorado Para by pistoleiro Ze Boba under the command of grileiro
Aluizio Viera Chaves, the ex-Counselor of the Embassy of Brazil in
Israel. (Reforma Agraria Porque?, 6); Top
right [2] Father Josimo Moraes Tavares, coordinator of the Commissao
Pastoral da Terra ( Church Land Commission) in the Parrots Beak Region
of Goias, was assassinated on April 15, 1986 in Imperatriz, Maranhao by
order of the UDR;
Bottom Left [3] Antonio Bispo dos Santos, "the
Bishop", was killed in 1987 on a road between Redencao and Conceicao de
Araguaia by a gunman named Tota; Bottom Ct [4]
Raimundo Ferreira Lima, "Gringo", was a presidential candidate for
the rural workers union in Conceicao do Araguaia and was assassinated a
few days before the elections; Bottom Left [5]
Maraca de Souza, Tuapa'i, a leader of the Gurani Indians, was assassinated
on November 21, 1983 in the indian village of Compestre, in Mato
Grosso do Sul, where he worked as a nurse.
5. Type of Environmental Problem: Deforestation
July through September is the burning season in Brazil for clearing land.
An estimated 8,000 fires burn each day and the smoke is so thick that for
weeks the sun is unable to penetrate the clouds. Any visibility of the
sky makes the sun look like a strange orange orb. Experts from Goddard
Space Center estimate around 240,000 fires set during the season.
The light spots
indicate fires from land clearing in Rondonia, one of the Brazilian states
in the Amazon that has witnessed drastic deforestation. The deforestation
in Rondonia will serve as a limited case study of what ranchers and farmers
are doing to the rain forest. As of 1988 deforestation in this state alone
were estimated at 20%. (Ellis, 792)
The images below illustrate the impact increased
migration and the whole land crisis has had in Rondonia.
Deforestation and Migration
|
Satellite Image: Rondonia 1973 |
| The 1973 Landsat1 Satellite photograph uses yellow to highlight deforestation
in the state of Rondonia, Brazil. Highway BR-364 slices the area down the
middle. |
Deforestation and Migration
|
Satellite Image: Rondonia in 1987 |
| The 1987 Landsat5 photograph uses green blue to highlight deforestation
in the state of Rondonia, Brazil. After only 15 years significant
land area has been cleared. |
What It Costs to "Get the Forest Back"...
As for the frenzy to clear land in order to herd cattle, it is lamentable
but true that millions of acres of land were limpado (cleared) simply
to claim ownership of them. The rain forest soils cannot sustain a ranch-based
economy. After less than 10 years a pasture loses its productivity. Again,
50% of all the lands cleared for ranching have been abandoned (owned but
unproductive). The cost to revitalize or recuperate the land is estimated
at $110 in fertilizer per acre. A cost of $3,000 is estimated to "get the
forest back." (Hecht and Cockburn, 178)
6. Conflict Time Frame: 1960s to 1990s
It may be helpful to use maps of the migration patterns of landless during
different periods to appreciate the relationship between destruction of
the rain forest, conflict and a failed land reform in Brazil.
Brazilian Migration Patterns into the Amazon
Influx into the
Amazons was heightened in the 1960's when the government encouraged colonization
of the rain forest in the name of economic development. Mato Grosso
do Sul and Para were the primary states containing large areas
of rain forest to be penetrated in the 1960's.
By
1980 33.6% of the total Brazilian population lived as migrants compared
to 8.5% in 1940 and 18.% in 1960.(Migracoes No Brasil, 21)
The violence in the countryside, the prospects of gold in the Amazonian
mines, and access to unclaimed land attracted thousands to the rain forest.
7. Environment-Conflict Link
Indirect Link: See Cause and Effect Chart ---
a) Land-Peasant relationship to deforestation
b)Land-Large landowners relationship to deforestation
III. Related Material
8. Related Cases
a) Congo Basin in
Central Africa covers some 3.6 million square km. It contains 80% of
Africa's rain forests and extends from Gabon on the Atlantic ocean through
Cameroon, Central African Republic, and the Democratic Republic of the
Congo (former Zaire). Life for rain forest dwellers such as the Efe and
Mbuti peoples ended as they had known it for the last 2000 years when the
Belgians imposed colonial rule. By 1930, the Belgian colonial authority
built roads with forced labor from villages and forest communities. Forest
farmers were compelled to switch from the traditional polycultural to monocultural
farming. Coffee and rice crops were required by colonial authorities for
external markets. Traditional land tenure systems ended. Extensive land
clearing that resulted in the creation of ecological deserts. High population
density induced by forced resettlements placed severe pressure on the land
as well. (Denslow and Padoch 1988, 125)
b) Indonesia represents 10% of
the world's remaining tropical rain forests. Of 190 million hectares in
Indonesia about 60% of it is under a canopy of forest. Like the Amazon,
it is an area of great biological diversity, an environ for hundreds of
different plant and animal species. The agricultural development of Indonesia's
forests is of great concern to environmentalists. Factors such as transmigration,
land-clearing and farming on marginal soil are included in the debates
in Indonesia just as they are in Brazil. (Denslow and Padoch 1988, 125)
d) ICE Cases:
Relevant Literature
Amnesty International. Brazil Briefing. Amnesty International Publications
(AI Index AMR/19/17/88), September 1988.
Amnesty International. Brazil: Authorized Violence in Rural Areas.
Amnesty International Publications (AI Index AMR/19/16/88), September 1988.
Denslow, Julie Sloan and Christine Padoch. People of theTropical
Rain Forest. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988.
Ellis, William S., "Brazil's Imperiled Rain Forest," National Geographic,
December 1988, 772-799.
Hecht, Susanna and Alexander Cockburn. The Fate of the Forest: Developers,
Destroyers, and Defenders of the Amazon. New York: Harper Collins Publishers,
1990.
McIntyre, Lauren, "The Last Days of Eden," National Geographic,
December 1988, 800-817.
Reforma Agraria, Porque? ( Why agrarian reform?). Brasilia: Associacao
Brasileira de Reforma Agraria (ABRA), 1986.
Relevant Web Sites
http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/aireport/ar97/AMR19.htm
http://www.amnesty.org/ailb/aipub/1996/SUM/2190796.htm
http://www.amnesty.org.uk/press/brazil_oct14.html
http://www.mukilteo.wednet.edu...A/Greenpage%20Folder/ran2.html
http://forests.org/gopher/brazil/demajust.txt
http://www.sedos.org/english/mark.htm