by Isabella Kenfield
Americas Program, Center for International Policy (CIP)

On March 7th—International Women's Day—dozens of Brazilian women occupied a research site of the U.S.-based agricultural biotechnology giant Monsanto in the state of São Paulo, Brazil, destroying the greenhouse and experimental plots of genetically-modified (GM) corn. Participants, members of the international farmers' organization La Vía Campesina, stated in a note that the act was to protest the Brazilian government's decision in February to legalize Monsanto's GM Guardian® corn, which came just weeks after the French government prohibited the corn due to environment and human health risks.

Stora Enso's Brazilian Imbroglio
by Maurna Desmond, Forbes.com

Paper maker Stora Enso is catching heat from activists in Brazil who recently invaded its factory and blocked major roads. The Finnish-Swedish company wants to plant roots in South America, but the locals haven't been very welcoming.

On Wednesday, Brazilian land rights group Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST) blocked eight roads in the Rio Grande do Sul state in Brazil to protest alleged police violence against peaceful and predominantly female activists a day earlier. MST says 900 protesters had invaded the 5200-acre Stora Enso tree farm. Police authorities report a head count of 600. The firm's stock has remained at $12.40 all day Thursday.

A New Report From the Oakland Institute & Terra de Direitos
by Camila Moreno with Anuradha Mittal

Oakland, CA February 2008: Later this year, the Bush administration is set to have discussions with lawmakers on whether the US import tariff (US $0.54 per gallon) on ethanol should be allowed to expire or not. Designed to protect US corn-based ethanol makers from cheaper imports, elimination of this import tariff is expected to have wide implications for ethanol exporting countries, especially Brazil that accounts for more than 70% of imports (2006 figures).

By Stephen Leahy

U.S. biofuels production is driving up food prices around the world, giving billions of poor people a very good reason to hate U.S. policy, say environmentalists.

"The U.S. has led the fight to stem global hunger, now we are creating hunger," said Lester Brown, president of the Earth Policy Institute, an environmental think tank in Washington.

RIO DE JANEIRO, Jan 24 (IPS) - Joao Pedro Stédile thinks that the World Social Forum (WSF) should remain a debating arena for civil society, because with all its breadth and variety, to attempt to agree on resolutions is "an illusion."

The Brazilian landless movement activist is also in favour of holding the WSF every three years, instead of annually, he said in an interview with IPS correspondent Mario Osava.

A member of the group that founded the WSF in the southern Brazilian city of Porto Alegre in 2001, Stédile is regarded as one of the main theorists of the Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST), and he belongs to the local chapter of Vía Campesina, an international non-governmental organisation (NGO).

We begin this year by taking on an important battle for the development of our country around Tax Reform and reform of the current economic policy. The role of taxation is not just apportioning the tax burden among the various sectors of society but is also a basic tool for income distribution and helps to shape the project for the country that we want to build for the future.