EarthAction

2021 EarthAction Project & Campaign Report

2021 EarthAction Project & Campaign Report

The following projects and campaigns were made possible with your support. Thank You.

2020 Action: Every month, 2020 Action educated and mobilized thousands of US citizens and encouraged them to communicate with US policymakers on critically important peace and environmental issues. Each month, 2020 produced a timely Action Alert with meaningful actions for citizens to take to protect our environment and security—usually to contact a policymaker facing a critical decision. For details, read 2020’s 2020 Action Report at 2020Action.org. 2020 Action just completed its 35^th year!

Strategies to Boost Fair Climate Action in the 2020-2030 Decades: EarthAction sponsored a Side Event at COP 26 UN Climate Conference held in Glasgow, Scotland, November 2021. We collaborated with The Group of Governance on Climate Change - Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya. They presented an equity-based analysis of the current NDCs; Climate Scorecard reported on efforts to reduce emissions by 50% by 2030, and the Asociación Proteger described real cases of community driven improvement of housing and schools, based on local resources.

The American Friends of the Palestinian House of Friendship: EarthAction helped to raise over $100,000 to support the Palestinian House of Friendship (PHF) in Nablus, Palestine and their programs including: Summer Camps; a Skate Park; after school programs and e-learning for kids who were unable to go to school due to COVID; Girl Scouts (160 members) who served elders, needy families, and orphans in the community; an older women’s chorus and the formation of a younger women’s chorus called Zunnar; the Open Gate Music Studio that produced recordings throughout the year; the creation of a Little Free Library in Nablus; a cultural folklore festival in Asira with music, dance, and hand-crafts displayed which more than 2,000 people attended; and a new program called, “The Green Hands Initiative,” where children learn to love the land and to plant vegetables and fruits.

Support for Indigenous Peoples: In 2021, in collaboration with the Save Our Spirits (S.O.S.) Fund, EarthAction provided over $60,000 in much-needed support for indigenous and ancestral communities around the world. These projects included the following:

The Elders Project (TEP) in Colombia: We continued to work with and to provide assistance to the traditional authorities (Mamos) of the Sierra Nevada of Santa Marta (SNSM) in Colombia. Rick Harlow, the Project Director, traveled to Colombia in August to distribute a new book of Kogui wisdom, published with TEP funding, to the pueblos of the SNSM. Rick returns to Colombia in December to coordinate the next Black Line Journey for the Kogui, Arhuaco, Wiwa and Kankuamos pueblos. These activities are of great help to the Elders in their efforts to strengthen their spiritual traditional practices.

TEP has also been working with the Hopi Elders.  In October Rick traveled to Arizona to assist the Hopi in realizing a 1,300 mile pilgrimage to 11 sacred sites that define their ancestral territorial boundaries. TEP will continue working with the Hopi in 2022 as they realize another pilgrimage next summer.

The Lalakea Foundation: We provided a grant to their Nā Wāhine ʻĀpapalani, Hawaiian women cultural practitioners who have been conducting ritual and ceremony on Maunakea for many years. They are dedicated to honoring the sacred Piko O Wākea through prayer, chant and ceremony that acknowledge Nā Kānaka o ka Mauna, Deities of the Mountain, and form connectivity with the sacred through space and time. Due to COVID, this project was extended into 2021.

Hopi Community: We provided support to several Hopi communities for their COVID-19 Emergency Response Hopi Contact Tracing Projects. They trained people within the community to carry out contact tracing in a number of Hopi villages that were being hard-hit by the pandemic.

Q’eros Ceremonial Terrace Project in Ecuador: Through the Wiraqocha Foundation, Fredy Flores Machaca & Hannah Rae, received a grant on February 1, 2021 to design and build a terrace as the first phase of creating a museum and center for the preservation of the Q’eros culture. The terrace will be a sacred place for the Q’eros to gather for communal ceremonies.

Restoring Ancestral Connection to the Environment— a Community-Led Project of the Moken People of Koh Surin. The Global Purpose Group, founded and directed by Bodhi Garrett, was the sponsor of this project. In February 2021 they received an S.O.S grant to provide cultural and ecological preservation, education for children, meaningful income for adults, and community empowerment for the Moken community at Koh Surin National Park. The islands are located in the Andaman Sea of Thailand.

Kaibeto Navajo COVID Relief: On the Dine' Nation, Sharon Claw-Watson organized a team of 12 volunteers (Kaibeto Covid Relief Team) that served the communities of Kaibeto, Inscription House, Shonto, Redlake (Tonalea), Navajo Mountain and Rocky Ridge on the Navajo Nation in Northern Arizona and Southern Utah. Our S.O.S. grant helped these communities to receive needed supplies including fresh food, healing herbs, water, medicines, vitamins, and boxes of food to keep the people in these communities, especially the elderly, healthy and safe from exposures to infection. Many of the volunteers used their own vehicles, traveling long rough unpaved roads to deliver supplies. Our grant provided food and needed supplies to 50 to 100 families for one to two months and paid for gas for the delivery vehicles.

Panina Makahiki/Closing Makahiki Ceremony 2021 in Hawaii: the project sponsor, Kohe Mālamalama O Kanaloa-Protect Kahoʻolawe Fund (PKF), received a grant for a closing ceremony in a series of ceremonies called, Makahiki Kaho‘olawe, that brought together their kūpuna (elders), kamaliʻi (children), kumu (experts/teachers) and ʻohana (families) from each island of Hawaiʻi to aide in their re-greening on the island and to secure blessings for Kahoʻolawe for the new year.

The Cordillera Peoples Alliance, Philippines received a grant to assist them with their response to the COVID-19 pandemic including the distribution of food relief consisting of rice, sugar, salt and cooking oil to a total of 500 families of indigenous people among the Ayangan tribe in the province of Ifugao. They also shared information on COVID-19 and held discussions on food security during the relief distribution in communities and conducted psycho-social sessions among vulnerable groups such as farmers, elders, youth, and informal workers.

Grass-Roots Organization for Women (GROW) Ghana: We provided support for Community-based Initiatives to address the impact of the Corona-19 virus in rural indigenous and local communities. They strengthened their outreach to prevent the spread of infection and addressed emerging public health issues that impacted vulnerable populations in rural areas who lacked access to essential services. This project went from June 2020 through May 2021.

NEW PROJECT Indigenous Solidarity Fund (ISF) In May 2021, EarthAction became the sponsor of ISF whose mission is to support elders, leaders, and wisdom-keepers of indigenous groups in Colombia and the Americas in their efforts to preserve and share their cultures and traditional practices. Click here to view a video made in 2021 by ISF Project Director Jesse Stammel of an urgent message from the revered Grandfather, Wisdom Keeper, Land Protector and Goldman Environmental Prize winner Werjayo Berito Kuwaru'wa of the U'Wa people in Colombia

Other Campaigns

Throughout 2021, EarthAction engaged in many other global campaigns for peace, justice and the environment through our website and social media. These included: the global launch of the Green Grids Initiative at the Climate Summit in Glasgow; COVAX, the global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines; the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons; The launch of the Youth Elders Fusion Initiative; For details visit: www.earthaction.org.

THANK YOU

EarthAction thanks all our Partner Organizations, members, donors and Board members for their ongoing participation and support. Special thanks to the Thomas D. Hormel Trust, the Stewart R. Mott Foundation, the Whatcom Community Foundation and the Save Our Spirits Fund.

Click here if you would like to make a donation to support our ongoing work.

World Future Day: Launch of Youth Fusion Elders on March 1

Launch of Youth Fusion Elders initiative
World Future Day/Nuclear Remembrance Day
Monday March 1, 2021. 6pm – 7:30 CET (12noon-1:30pm Eastern Time USA)

The World Future Day Launch of Youth Fusion Elders will be an intergenerational dialogue between youth and elders within the peace and nuclear disarmament fields. We will learn from the highly valuable experiences and knowledge of ‘Elders’ in a conversation facilitated by youth leaders.

Click here to register. Event facebook page.

Youth Fusion Elders:
‘Elder –a person having authority because of age and experience’
Merriam-Webster Dictionary

Youth Fusion highlights the importance of inter-generational dialogue, and of youth learning from the experience of those who have been long-time and effective leaders in the peace and disarmament fields. In this regard, we recognise and affirm Youth Fusion Elders, those we hold in high esteem, and whose leadership, accomplishments, ideas and wisdom we highlight online and through our activities.

March 1: World Future Day/Nuclear Remembrance Day
The Youth Fusion Elders launch event is held in conjunction with a 24 hour round-the-world conversation for World Future Day which starts in Aotearoa-New Zealand at 12noon and moves westward each hour to the next time-zone. March 1 is also Nuclear Remembrance Day, the anniversary of the most destructive nuclear weapons test ever conducted in the Pacific. The impact of the radiation dispersed from this test will last for generations.   

Youth Fusion:
Youth Fusion, the youth network of Abolition 2000, is a world-wide platform for young individuals and organizations in the field of nuclear disarmament, risk-reduction and non-proliferation. Youth Fusion  focuses on youth action and intergenerational dialogue, building on the links between disarmament, peace, climate action, sustainable development and building back better from the pandemic.

Please click here for more information. 

URGENT APPEAL: Stop the demolition of the monument of Macliing Dulag, Pedro Dungoc, Lumbaya Gayudan and other heroes of the Anti-Chico Dams Struggle

We appeal for your urgent support to prevent the demolition of the monument of Macliing Dulag, Pedro Dungoc, Lumbaya Gayudan and other heroes of the historic Anti-Chico Dam Resistance!

This afternoon, the Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA) received a notice from the Upper Kalinga District Engineering Office (UKDEO) of the Department of Public Works and Highways saying that the heroes’ monument encroached on a portion of the national road. The notice of demolition states that we are given seven (7) days from receipt of the notice to voluntarily remove the monument. If we fail to do so, UKDEO will remove the monument and charge the costs that will be incurred to the Cordillera Peoples Alliance and that they will resort to proper sanctions provided for by existing laws and rules of the government. There was no due process or dialogues held with the CPA on the matter. They want to make us pay for the cost of their sacrilegious acts. These heroes died from the hands of the government and now their legacy is bound to be killed once more. This is downright tyranny!

Last week, the PNP Provincial Advisory Council of the Kalinga Provincial Police Office requested the provincial government through the Provincial Board Committee on Oversight to enact a resolution to address the removal of the heroes’ monument.

The monument was built by the Cordillera Peoples Alliance in 2017, together with the families of the heroes and martyrs as well as people from Bugnay, the site of the monument. It was built to honor the legacy of our heroes and martyrs who successfully opposed the Marcos Dictatorship’s Chico Dams Project that would have brought massive destruction to the communities, culture and environment of the people of Kalinga and Mountain Province. It is a reminder to present and future generations of the valiant struggle by our elders to defend the ancestral land. It is a reminder of the Butbut tribe’s place in the history of the Chico valley, the Cordillera, the country, and the world.

It has been more than 3 years since the monument was built but it is only now that UKDEO and the police are raising the issue of encroachment and using this as an excuse to dismantle the monument. The DPWH should have stopped the construction from the start if indeed there was a violation. The people of Bugnay including Macliing Dulag’s family had welcomed the project and even helped build the monument on their ancestral land.

Demolition of the monument is tyranny especially at this time of COVID-19 pandemic! These heroes deserve the utmost respect of the people and the government. Their monument deserves to be in a place of honor within their ancestral domain.

Demolishing the monument is double injustice to the Anti-Chico Dams heroes. Macliing Dulag was shot dead by members of the Philippine Army led by Lieutenant Leodegardo Adalem on April 24, 1980. Until now, justice has not been served. Now his monument along with other heroes and martyrs is also bound to be destroyed.

To demolish and desecrate the monument is a brazen act of obliterating the Cordillera people’s history of struggle against oppression and injustice. It is part of the government’s acts of historical revisionism or distorting and erasing the true history of the people’s resistance and heroism which remain relevant until today.

This threat to demolish the heroes’ monument is another attack against the people, the Cordillera Peoples Alliance, and against our heroes and martyrs who resisted development aggression and State repression. It is a part of the implementation of Executive Order 70 or the “Whole of Nation” approach to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (ELCAC) whereby communities and even local government units are being pressured and forced to comply. Historical revisionism is no doubt one of the goals of ELCAC.

Help save the monument from destruction!

The following are some of the ways you can help:

1. Send letters of concern to stop and prevent the demolition to the following, and furnish us a copy through [email protected]:

1. 1.  Eugene M. Batalao

            District Engineer

            Upper Kalinga District Engineering Office

            Department of Public Works and Highways

            Email: [email protected]

       b.  Khadaffy Tanggol

                       Regional Director

                       Department of Public Works and Highways – Cordillera

                       Email: [email protected]

                   c. General R’win Pagkalinawan

                       Director, Police Regional Office – Cordillera

                       Email: [email protected]

                   d. Andres B. Ngao-i

                       Chairman, Philippine National Police Provincial Advisory Council

                       Bulanao, Tabuk City, Kalinga

                       Email: [email protected]

2. Issue statements of condemnation against the demolition of the heroes’ monument and post your stories and opinions.

3. Sign the online petition to stop the demolition of the monument at http://chng.it/9ydD8hK2c6

4. Support the Defend the Cordillera campaign against plunder and State terror. Sign the Global Pact at ph. Watch what's the campaign is all about here.

For more information, please read:

• Alert (October 5, 2020) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1D9Pl63ty6A1wi41LwH18kqth5Hp4lQ31/view?usp=sharing
• Open Letter to the Butbut tribe (October 7, 2020) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1D9Pl63ty6A1wi41LwH18kqth5Hp4lQ31/view?usp=sharing
• Demolition notice from the Upper Kalinga District Engineering Office (October 1, 2020) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1D9Pl63ty6A1wi41LwH18kqth5Hp4lQ31/view?usp=sharing

For inquiries, please contact the Cordillera Peoples Alliance regional secretariat at [email protected], [email protected].

Thank you for your support and solidarity!

CORDILLERA PEOPLES ALLIANCE

In the 11th Hour Court Halts Copper Mine From Desecrating Native American Tribes' Ancestral Grounds

 

An elder of the Tohono O’odham Nation speaks out against Hudbay Minerals’ proposed copper mine.

 

Tucson, AZ — Last night a judge ruled in favor of three Native American Tribes’ challenge to the U.S. Forest Service’s approval of Hudbay Minerals’ plan to raze the Tribes’ ancestral lands to construct a mile-wide open-pit copper mine in Arizona’s Santa Rita Mountains. These public lands hold thousands of years of the Tribes’ cultural heritage, including ancestral burial grounds, ancient village sites, and sacred springs. The Forest Service assumed Hudbay had a right to obliterate these public lands to pave the way for what would be the third largest copper mine in the United States — and quick profits for the company. The court fundamentally disagreed, holding that the Forest Service’s assumption was a “crucial error” that “tainted the Forest Service’s evaluation of the Rosemont Mine from the start.” Accordingly, the court threw out the Forest Service’s decision, preventing Hudbay from moving forward. Earthjustice is representing the Tohono O’odham Nation, the Pascua Yaqui Tribe, and the Hopi Tribe in court.

“This is a victory for the Nation and all of Southern Arizona,” said Ned Norris Jr., Chairman of the Tohono O’odham Nation. “The devastation that the Rosemont mine would bring to our land, water, and cultural resources is well-documented and cannot be allowed to happen. The Nation will continue to fight to ensure that our sacred lands and the region’s water are protected.”

Hudbay Minerals’ plans — now stopped in their tracks by the court’s ruling — included clearing dozens of known archeological sites in the Santa Ritas that include ancestral burial sites. The company planned to target Gaylor Ranch, a historic Hokokam village, proposing to completely excavate this site and remove the remains of the Tribes’ ancestors within the first few months of construction. Hudbay Minerals intended to remove human remains, funerary objects, sacred items, and objects of cultural patrimony by digging backhoe trenches, mechanically stripping the site, and shovel stripping the land.

“The Pascua Yaqui Tribe is pleased with Judge Soto’s decision to protect the cultural and environmental resources that are so sacred to our people. We are stewards of the land, air, and water and must continue to protect our environment not only for our tribal members but for the community-at-large,” said Robert Valencia, Chairman of the Pascua Yaqui Tribe. “We are grateful to our partners in this effort — the Center for Biological Diversity, Save the Scenic Santa Ritas, Arizona Mining Reform Coalition, and the Sierra Club Grand Canyon Chapter as well as the Tribal leadership from the Tohono O’odham Nation and the Hopi Tribe — who have stood side-by-side with us to ensure that these sacred sites are protected for us, for our children, and for generations to come.”

The Tribes were again facing the threat of irreversible cultural destruction after suffering similar abuse in the 1980s, when the Anamax Mining Company proposed to mine the same site. The company mishandled the burial grounds, and while they removed some of the ancestral remains, they left graves and the village grounds open to the elements when the company went bankrupt and abandoned the site a few years later. The Tribes’ ancestral remains were shipped to the University of Arizona, where they were warehoused for thirty years while the Tribes fought to repatriate them. They were only returned to the Tohono O’odham Nation several years ago.

Trump administration greased the wheels for the massive mine, disregarding environmental laws and the unacceptable cultural destruction. The Forest Service assumed, without any basis in fact or law, that Hudbay had a right to destroy these public lands to construct its copper mine. Several months ago, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers abruptly granted a critical Clean Water Act permit for the mine, ignoring over eight years of opposition from the Environmental Protection Agency, Native American Tribes, and the Corps’ own Los Angeles District (which recommended denial of the permit in 2016).

Hudbay Minerals has a track record of trampling indigenous and tribal rights. The company has been accused of profound human rights abuses at their Fenix nickel mine in Guatemala.

“This ruling affirms the fundamental principle that nobody gets a free pass to destroy our public lands,” said Stu Gillespie, staff attorney with Earthjustice. “As the Court explained, the Forest Service provided no basis for assuming Hudbay had a right to destroy thousands of years of the Tribes’ cultural heritage. Because this crucial error tainted the entire process, the Court threw out the Forest Service’s decision and stopped Rosemont from destroying these sacred public lands.”

A MINE SO MASSIVE IT WOULD PIERCE THE AQUIFER

The Rosemont Copper Mine is slated for public and private lands in Arizona’s Santa Rita Mountains. The mine is so colossal it would entail dumping 1.9 billion tons of toxic mining waste on public lands, burying over 3,500 acres of National Forest System lands that contain dozens of prehistoric tribal sites.

Rosemont would also excavate a half-mile deep pit that would puncture the regional aquifer, reversing groundwater flows and depleting surface flows at multiple springs, seeps, and streams into perpetuity. These impacts would be felt as far away as Tucson, Arizona.

The Santa Ritas are home to the last jaguar population in the United States. The iconic “El Jefe” jaguar has been caught on film over the years in these mountains.

 

From EarthJustice. Learn more here.

Philippine President seeks to have 600 Indigenous leaders "tagged" as terrorists! Emergency Response Needed!

United Nations Special Rapporteur on the rights of Indigenous Peoples Victoria Tauli-Corpuz. Image Credit: Eco-Business

The human rights situation in the Philippines is deteriorating with the widespread cases of extrajudicial killings and ongoing attacks against voices critical to the government.

A petition was recently filed in court by the Philippine State Prosecutor of the Department of Justice (DOJ), that seeks to have a number of indigenous peoples' leaders and human rights defenders declared as terrorists and outlaws pursuant to the National Security Act of 2007.

The list of alleged terrorists includes the following renowned indigenous leaders and human rights defenders from the Cordillera Region:

1. Ms. Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, former Chairperson of the UN Permanent Forum of Indigenous Issues;
2. Ms. Joan Carling, Co-convener of the Indigenous Peoples Major Group on the Sustainable Development Goals, former Secretary General of the Asia Indigenous Peoples Pact (AIPP) and member of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues;
3. Ms. Joanna Cariño, member of the Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA) Advisory Council and SANDUGO co-chairperson
4. Mr. Windel Bolinget, Chairperson of the Cordillera Peoples Alliance (CPA);
5. Atty. Jose Molintas, human rights lawyer and former member of the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (EMRIP);
6. Ms. Beverly Longid, global coordinator for the Indigenous Peoples Movement for Self-Determination and Liberation;
7. Ms. Jeanette Ribaya Cawiding, Regional Coordinator of the Alliance of Concerned Teachers - Cordillera; and
8. Mr. Sherwin De Vera, Regional Coordinator of DEFEND- Ilocos and member of the Save The Abra River Movement (STARM)

An estimate of around ten (10) indigenous peoples' leaders and human right advocates from Mindanao are also included in this list.

TAKE ACTION:

ORGANIZATIONS: Add your name to a letter to President Duterte (see below). Email your organization's name and country to: [email protected] and to [email protected]. The deadline for endorsements is MARCH 18, 2018.

INDIVIDUALS: Sign on to this letter at Change.Org using this link: 1. H.E. Rodrigo Duterte President of the Republic Malacañang Palace, JP Laurel St., San Miguel : STOP THE HARASSMENT & INTIMIDATION OF INDIGENOUS PEOPLES' LEADERS / HUMAN RIGHTS DEFENDERS.

EVERYONE: Send letters of concern to the Philippine Embassies in your respective countries and the government officials listed in the letter of concern below. 

Kindly inform the Indigenous group <[email protected]> of any actions you have undertaken so they can share this as part of their campaign.

Thank you!

Download FINAL Letter of Concern Phils-March12-2

FUNDING ANNOUNCEMENT: Keepers of the Earth Fund Self-Governance and FPIC Initiative

From First Peoples Worldwide:

First Peoples Worldwide (First Peoples) is pleased to announce its new Self-Governance and Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) initiative, a funding opportunity to create or strengthen existing dialogue between Indigenous communities and corporations with respect to Indigenous rights and resources. The colonial period left Indigenous communities deeply scarred; their land, culture, and rights were systematically stripped away by colonists looking to profit from the rich assets utilized by Indigenous Peoples. Indigenous Peoples have struggled in the modern world to have their rights and traditional cultures acknowledged by their respective governments, countries, and the world at large. Now, Indigenous Peoples are speaking up to stop this blatant disregard for their rights, and they are being heard.
 
In 2007, the United Nations adopted the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (the Declaration), which has since been ratified by 143 countries and sets a global standard for the treatment of Indigenous Peoples. This vital, though not legally binding, declaration is helping to secure Indigenous rights worldwide, and FPIC, which is part of the Declaration, acts as an informal guideline to bringing Indigenous communities closer to securing self-governance.
 
The primary purpose of the Self-Governance and FPIC initiative is to empower Indigenous communities to use their traditional knowledge and governance structures, decision-making processes, and alliances with other communities, to develop strategic approaches to working with corporations encroaching on their lands and ways of life. To further promote FPIC policy development, this initiative will strengthen Indigenous community organizing, capacity in policy formulation, and communication efforts with governing or corporate authorities.
 
Through its Keepers of the Earth small grants program and fund, First Peoples promotes Indigenous self-governance and capacity to exercise FPIC. Grant applications will be accepted on a monthly basis through October 31^st, annually.

For guidelines and grant applications, please visit First Peoples website (www.firstpeoples.org/grants) or contact [email protected]. 

To apply for the grant, please visit:
http://firstpeoples.org/grants/apply-for-a-grant

 

Chasing the Sun in the Navajo Nation

The oldest ethnic group in the United States received a new form of power. 

Learn more about NationSwell here.

Larry Merculieff "Native Knowing"

Our friends at the Sacred Fire Foundation who support people and projects to strengthen indigenous cultures around the world, sent us a wonderful announcement about their 2014 annual campaign. You can view their announcement here. We encourage you to support their work.

Their announcement  included a link to a fabulous TEDx talk by Aleut Elder, Larry Merculieff, a 2012 Ancient Wisdom Rising presenter, teaching about this time in which "we have reversed the laws for living." See Larry's TEDx talk below.

 

Gratitude to the Sacred Fire Foundation and all the projects they support that are doing this important work.

Stop the “Carbon Cowboys” from Turning the Amazon Rainforest into their Private Palm Oil Plantation

Image source: Andre Penner, CTV news

RIGHT NOW, the world’s remaining rainforests are being cut down and replaced with palm oil and soybean plantations, and cattle ranches. Here’s an Action Alert from Friends of the Amazon. Please take the action they suggest to send a message to the President of Peru.

“Currently, scammers are cheating native Amazonians out of their land under the pretext of creating REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) projects. These unscrupulous businessmen have been termed "Carbon Cowboys." While they say that they want to protect the forest, what they really want is to get the land for free and cut down the forest and replace it with palm oil plantations. They lie and say that they are representatives of the United Nations and the World Bank and promise the communities "billions of dollars" from carbon offset credits. Using these tactics, they trick vulnerable and trusting people into signing unfair contracts with hidden clauses giving the scammers a power of attorney that essentially gives these conmen the forest for free, allowing them to harvest the timber and replace the native forest with monocultures of palm oil trees.”

Peru - Gas Expansion in Amazon 'Indigenous Reserve'

The Peruvian government is pushing ahead with plans to expand gas operations in a supposedly protected reserve in the Amazon despite calls by the United Nations to suspend them.

The company leading the operations, Pluspetrol, moved one step closer to proceeding with the expansion of the Camisea gas project - Peru's biggest ever energy development - following a report by the vice-ministry of inter-culturality (VMI) last week.

Pluspetrol's plans include drilling 18 wells and conducting seismic tests in an 'intangible' reserve for indigenous peoples living in 'voluntary isolation' and 'initial contact'.

The reserve is also part of the buffer zone for the Manu national park, where Unesco says the biological diversity "exceeds that of any other place on Earth."

Pilar Cameno, from Peruvian NGO DAR, told the Guardian that the expansion could lead to "violent encounters" between gas project workers and indigenous peoples, "increased mortality rates", the loss of land and access to resources, and environmental contamination.

"The Peruvian state must heed the UN rapporteur's recommendations and implement them", Cameno says. "What's at stake here is the survival of the indigenous peoples in isolation and initial contact - not just as individuals, but as whole cultures."

Here's how you can help:

• Writing a letter to the Peruvian government can make a real difference.
• Write to your Senators and members of Congress (US)
• Write to your local Peruvian embassy

Article courtesy of The Guardian. Learn more here.

Images from Zoom's Edible Plants

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