Agribusiness
Brazilian court halts Belo Monte hydro-electric dam project
A federal court in Brazil has ordered the immediate suspension of work on the huge Belo Monte hydro-electric dam in the Amazon.
The court says local indigenous people have not been properly consulted. Officials point out that the builders of the dam will be able to appeal against the decision. Once completed, the 11,000-megawatt dam, in Brazil's Para state, would be the third largest hydro-electric dam in the world. Belo Monte would only be smaller than the Three Gorges in China, and Itaipu which is jointly run by Brazil and Paraguay. The project, which has been heavily criticised by environmentalists, was approved by the Brazilian Congress in 2005. It is expected to flood a vast area of tropical forest.
"Agrarian Reform has stopped completely," said MST Leader
By Jose Coutinho Junior
The Minister of Agrarian Development (MDA), Pepe Vargas, in an interview with Carta Maior declared the decrease in the coming years of the number of families settled pursuant to agrarian reform.
The minister also claims that the number of families living in the encampments has decreased. For Alexandre Conceição, from the National Coordination of the MST, the statements mask the reality of the Brazilian countryside.
Check out the interview with the Página do MST:
Agri-Business, Pesticides and "Agri-Cancer"
May 31, 2012 by Brasil do Fato
The three words above are not mere propaganda. Over the past ten years Brazilian agribusiness has taken over as the form of production in agriculture. It is a model of agricultural production, now subordinated to the interests of finance capital and transnational corporations. When allied to large Brazilian farmers, they intrude on nature.
FINAL DECLARATION OF THE PEOPLES’ SUMMIT AT RIO+20
FINAL DECLARATION OF THE PEOPLES’ SUMMIT AT RIO+20 FOR SOCIAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE IN DEFENSE OF THE COMMONS, AGAINST THE COMMODIFICATION OF LIFE
Dilma – Veto All of It! In Defense of the Forest Code
by Luiz Zarref
Leader of La Via Campesina Brasil
The bill that amends the Brazilian Forest Code, voted on this week in the Chamber of Deputies, represents the maximum agenda of the ruralists. The caucus that supports agribusiness and defends those who commit environmental crimes showed their unity and succeeded in approving language so intertwined that it affects the whole bill.
In Dilma Visit, Protesters Recall Martyrs of the Amazon
By Felipe Milanez in Washington
The Embassy of Brazil in Washington, a modernist building that contrasts with the classical properties of the beautiful Embassy Row, the sector of embassies of the U.S. capital, hosted on Monday April 9th a march that brought together about one hundred people, including students, activists and Brazilians living in the region, who demonstrated during the visit of President Rousseff the city.
The protest, according to organizers, had four reasons: the violence in the countryside, especially in the Amazon; the impunity of the masterminds and executors of these crimes; changes in the Brazilian Forestry Code; and the construction of large dams in the Amazon.
Amid the flags of the Movement of Landless Rural Workers (MST), posters stamped images of the couple José Cláudio Ribeiro da Silva and Maria do Espirito Santo da Silva, murdered on May 24, 2011. They were next to pictures of Dorothy Stang, Chico Mendes and a scene of the burial of 19 landless workers killed in the massacre of Eldorado dos Carajas in 1996.
Vale Voted "Worst Company in the World"
The votes are in! Vale, the Brazilian mining company, has been voted the worst company in the world. Vale received 25,042 votes edging out Tepco, Japan’s large energy company which blatantly disregarded structural safety of its nuclear plants resulting in the post-tsunami disaster.
Statement by Joao Pedro Stedile in meeting with President Dilma
Transcription of the talk by João Pedro Stedile, of the MST, in the meeting between Dilma and representatives of civil society held on January 26 2012 during the Thematic Social Forum in Porto Alegre.
General Director of FAO visits the MST agrarian reform store in Porto Alegre
While visiting the MST Agrarian Reform Store in the public market of Porto Allegre (RS), Jose Graziano da Silva, General Director of the United Nations Organization for Food and Agriculture (FAO) saw the successful products derived from settlements for agrarian reform and family farming.