Campaigners fear a new surge of forest destruction as a result of both the reactionary Copenhagen Accord and a new European Union bio-fuels directive.
It seems that EU member states will be forced to accept palm oil grown in plantations planted on cleared forest – whether they like it or not.
The EU is committed to a target of 10% of all road transport fuel being based on renewable energy by 2020, and a new directive claims that palm oil plantations can be classified as forest, and meet so-called “sustainable standards”.
According to Rainforest Rescue, razing rainforest to plant oil palm would not count as a change in land use under the new directive, which also says that “member states may not set additional criteria of their own. They may not exclude biofuels/bioliquids on sustainability grounds where these meet the sustainability criteria laid down in the Directive”.
This is entirely in line with the Copenhagen Accord, the wrecking agreement forced through by powerful nations at last year’s climate conference.
Without a successor to Kyoto the controls on carbon off-setting (weak as they were) will become non-existent. It will lead to large-scale destruction of eco-systems and unprecedented land grabs, as spurious projects are classified as carbon offsets. There will even be carbon credits for tree and crop monocultures and GM soya, planted on cleared rainforest.
Stella Semino from Grupo de Reflexion Rural (Argentina) states: “If these new proposals are agreed upon we will see a massive boost for crop and tree plantations alike which, in the name of ‘climate change mitigation’, will speed up the destruction of forests and other vital ecosystems, the spread of industrial agriculture, and land grabbing against small-farmers, indigenous peoples and forest communities. Industrial monocultures are already a major cause of climate change and their expansion will make it worse.”
The problem is even bigger than palm oil – the whole concept of bio-fuels replacing oil is flawed because of the nature of the capitalist system and the system of private land ownership. An example is the development of new oil plants that will grow on so-called “marginal land”.
The Jatropha plant is being grown by Kijani Energy of Canada in Mozambique on land classified as marginal. This very experimental process, with an incredibly toxic plant which can harm farmers as they harvest and crush it, is already being claimed as a biol-fuel breakthrough.
It is reported that Kijani has now purchased 200,000 acres of land in the Thar province of Pakistan for Jatropha cultivation. Local people say that far from being unused land, this area belongs to them, and their centuries old livestock grazing rights are being violated.
In our Manifesto of Revolutionary Solutions we reject the idea of mitigation and adaptation to climate change, within the existing capitalist economic structures. It is damaging the poorest and most powerless in society, not protecting them from the effects of climate change – and it is doing it without making any significant reductions in emissions. An alternative system of energy production and land ownership is urgently needed.
Penny Cole
Environment editor
For revolutionary solutions to create a sustainable, not-for-profit economy in place of global capital alongside a real democracy based on People’s Assemblies. Visit our web site at www.aworldtowin.net
Showing posts with label rainforest. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rainforest. Show all posts
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Food crisis fuels new land grab
A new global land grab threatens not only the world's climate but the survival of some of the poorest people on the planet. From Brazil to Cuba, Mexico to Madagascar, governments and corporations are buying up land to bolster their own dwindling food and fuel resources.
Malaysia’s Federal Land Development Authority, for example, has a joint venture to clear up to 300,000 acres of Brazilian rainforest for palm oil plantations. The investment cost is just $800 million dollars. Calling for urgent action to halt the plunder, rainforest campaigners explain that:
“Global ecological sustainability and local well-being depend critically upon ending all industrial development in the world's remaining old forests – including plantations, logging, mining and dams. The amount of primary and old growth forests that have been lost has already overshot the carrying capacity of Earth. Globally there are not enough old forests to maintain climatic and hydrological cycles, meet local forest dwellers' needs, and to maintain ecosystems and the biosphere in total.”
Releasing stored carbon into the atmosphere, and cutting down crucial carbon sinks means faster climate change and more species extinction. But palm, soya and other cash crops grown for bio-diesel are claimed as climate change mitigation in the topsy turvy world of globalised capital. Every day some 30 square miles of virgin forest is cleared and the destruction is speeding up, in spite of all the pious statements of world governments.
The land grab is driven by growing food and fuel crises. China leases land in Cuba and Africa. Saudi Arabia holds the largest foreign ownership or control of African farmland in Sudan. Qatar has agricultural land in Indonesia, the Philippines, Bahrain, Kuwait and Burma. While a political crisis is leading to civil war in Pakistan, the government’s Investment Ministry has nevertheless put a million acres of farmland up for long-term investment or sale to foreign interests. All of this amounts to a new form of what might be called corporate imperialism, funded by sovereign wealth funds or corporations like Daewoo which are almost indistinguishable from state governments.
This is not empty land and not only forest is being cleared. People are being moved out of their homes to make way for foreign-owned agri-business. Species of all kinds are being burned up and sacrificed on the altar of profit.
Where they can, people are fighting back. The new government of Madagascar has repudiated a deal signed by the previous government, to lease 1.3 million hectares of land to Daewoo. Madagascans were so enraged by the plan they brought down the government earlier this year. In Kenya, protesters are trying to stop their government selling off their homes to Qatari interests.
As food and water shortages increase, powerful interests across the globe are declaring economic war on the poor. If need be they will take military action to ensure their survival. What they won’t do is voluntarily end the capitalist system of production and distribution which is at the heart of all our problems.
The planet grows enough calories to feed all its people already. But poor people can’t afford to buy food at prices that will deliver profits for investors. The crises of food, climate, water and fuel are in fact one major resource crisis driven by an unsustainable economic system. End that system, and we can begin to make a start on tackling these problems.
Penny Cole
Environment editor
Malaysia’s Federal Land Development Authority, for example, has a joint venture to clear up to 300,000 acres of Brazilian rainforest for palm oil plantations. The investment cost is just $800 million dollars. Calling for urgent action to halt the plunder, rainforest campaigners explain that:
“Global ecological sustainability and local well-being depend critically upon ending all industrial development in the world's remaining old forests – including plantations, logging, mining and dams. The amount of primary and old growth forests that have been lost has already overshot the carrying capacity of Earth. Globally there are not enough old forests to maintain climatic and hydrological cycles, meet local forest dwellers' needs, and to maintain ecosystems and the biosphere in total.”
Releasing stored carbon into the atmosphere, and cutting down crucial carbon sinks means faster climate change and more species extinction. But palm, soya and other cash crops grown for bio-diesel are claimed as climate change mitigation in the topsy turvy world of globalised capital. Every day some 30 square miles of virgin forest is cleared and the destruction is speeding up, in spite of all the pious statements of world governments.
The land grab is driven by growing food and fuel crises. China leases land in Cuba and Africa. Saudi Arabia holds the largest foreign ownership or control of African farmland in Sudan. Qatar has agricultural land in Indonesia, the Philippines, Bahrain, Kuwait and Burma. While a political crisis is leading to civil war in Pakistan, the government’s Investment Ministry has nevertheless put a million acres of farmland up for long-term investment or sale to foreign interests. All of this amounts to a new form of what might be called corporate imperialism, funded by sovereign wealth funds or corporations like Daewoo which are almost indistinguishable from state governments.
This is not empty land and not only forest is being cleared. People are being moved out of their homes to make way for foreign-owned agri-business. Species of all kinds are being burned up and sacrificed on the altar of profit.
Where they can, people are fighting back. The new government of Madagascar has repudiated a deal signed by the previous government, to lease 1.3 million hectares of land to Daewoo. Madagascans were so enraged by the plan they brought down the government earlier this year. In Kenya, protesters are trying to stop their government selling off their homes to Qatari interests.
As food and water shortages increase, powerful interests across the globe are declaring economic war on the poor. If need be they will take military action to ensure their survival. What they won’t do is voluntarily end the capitalist system of production and distribution which is at the heart of all our problems.
The planet grows enough calories to feed all its people already. But poor people can’t afford to buy food at prices that will deliver profits for investors. The crises of food, climate, water and fuel are in fact one major resource crisis driven by an unsustainable economic system. End that system, and we can begin to make a start on tackling these problems.
Penny Cole
Environment editor
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Threat to Amazon grows
The news of a huge rise in the rate of deforestation of the vast Amazon rainforest is one of the most serious indications yet that governments are standing more or less idly by as the conditions for climate change worsen. While they may wring their hands in concern, they are essentially taking on the role of spectators as global warming continues its acceleration.
Take the Brazilian government under President Lula. His attempts to protect the rainforest are so puny that they have come to nought. The Brazilian government has announced that in the last five months of 2007 alone, some 3,235 sq km (1,250 sq miles) of the rainforest were lost. We are talking about what is referred to as the “lungs of the world”, a massive forest that holds and soaks up huge amounts of carbon dioxide. Satellite imaging experts say the rate of deforestation is unprecedented and could even be far higher after further analysis is completed.
Brazilian officials admit that a rise in the price of soya has encouraged companies and farmers to clear the forest at an increasingly rapid rate. This price hike is itself inextricably linked back to Lula’s government and climate change. One of the reasons soya is in short supply around the world is the fact that it is being used increasingly as a source of so-called biofuels. These are being put forward as a “cleaner” alternative to fossil fuels.
Only last year, the Lula government signed a deal with the US government to expand production of soya beans. Because soya beans are also used in 60% of all processed food, a rise in prices is now being felt by shoppers around the world. Biofuels are a key plank of the European Union’s market-driven, carbon trading approach to curbing carbon emissions. The EU reacted angrily to a UK Parliamentary report this week which concluded that biofuel targets were damaging the environment and threatening food supplies.
In the past 40 years, close to 20% of the Amazon has been cut down. Last year, Lula said his government's efforts to control illegal logging and introduce better certification of land ownership had helped reduce forest clearance significantly. The latest figures show this to be nonsense. In practice, the government’s efforts have been minimal. "We have a national plan to fight deforestation that, historically, was a good plan on paper but lacked implementation both due to political will and due to resources," says Marcelo Furtado, campaigns director for Greenpeace in Brazil.
“Although the government could celebrate in recent years a decrease in deforestation, the fact is that structurally this didn't change. The environment ministry still lacks funding. You still have situations where the police don't have a helicopter to fly over a certain area or there is no fuel in the truck to go to verify if an area is being deforested or not. You still have a problem with availability of maps," Furtado said. “The tools to decrease deforestation and monitor implementation of the law are still not good enough." At the United Nations Conference on Climate Change in Bali, Indonesia, last month, Brazil announced the creation of a voluntary fund to protect the Amazon, due to be launched this year. This is all too little, too late.
Paul Feldman
AWTW communications editor
Take the Brazilian government under President Lula. His attempts to protect the rainforest are so puny that they have come to nought. The Brazilian government has announced that in the last five months of 2007 alone, some 3,235 sq km (1,250 sq miles) of the rainforest were lost. We are talking about what is referred to as the “lungs of the world”, a massive forest that holds and soaks up huge amounts of carbon dioxide. Satellite imaging experts say the rate of deforestation is unprecedented and could even be far higher after further analysis is completed.
Brazilian officials admit that a rise in the price of soya has encouraged companies and farmers to clear the forest at an increasingly rapid rate. This price hike is itself inextricably linked back to Lula’s government and climate change. One of the reasons soya is in short supply around the world is the fact that it is being used increasingly as a source of so-called biofuels. These are being put forward as a “cleaner” alternative to fossil fuels.
Only last year, the Lula government signed a deal with the US government to expand production of soya beans. Because soya beans are also used in 60% of all processed food, a rise in prices is now being felt by shoppers around the world. Biofuels are a key plank of the European Union’s market-driven, carbon trading approach to curbing carbon emissions. The EU reacted angrily to a UK Parliamentary report this week which concluded that biofuel targets were damaging the environment and threatening food supplies.
In the past 40 years, close to 20% of the Amazon has been cut down. Last year, Lula said his government's efforts to control illegal logging and introduce better certification of land ownership had helped reduce forest clearance significantly. The latest figures show this to be nonsense. In practice, the government’s efforts have been minimal. "We have a national plan to fight deforestation that, historically, was a good plan on paper but lacked implementation both due to political will and due to resources," says Marcelo Furtado, campaigns director for Greenpeace in Brazil.
“Although the government could celebrate in recent years a decrease in deforestation, the fact is that structurally this didn't change. The environment ministry still lacks funding. You still have situations where the police don't have a helicopter to fly over a certain area or there is no fuel in the truck to go to verify if an area is being deforested or not. You still have a problem with availability of maps," Furtado said. “The tools to decrease deforestation and monitor implementation of the law are still not good enough." At the United Nations Conference on Climate Change in Bali, Indonesia, last month, Brazil announced the creation of a voluntary fund to protect the Amazon, due to be launched this year. This is all too little, too late.
Paul Feldman
AWTW communications editor
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)