ΑΝΑΚΟΙΝΩΣΗ ΤΥΠΟΥ-Greenpeace

   Greenpeace launches ‘jaguars’ to stop forest destruction

   

    Buenos Aires, Argentina July 26th 2004: Greenpeace activists, dressed as jaguars on motorbikes, immobilised bulldozers to prevent them destroying precious forests in a remote region of north west Argentina today. The forests are being cut down to grow Monsanto’s genetically engineered soya, used to feed cows, pigs and chicken in Europe and China. (1)

   

    Nine Greenpeace activists, including five ‘jaguars’, located bulldozers in Salta, on the border of the Great Chaco and Yungas forests. They climbed onto the machines and used chains to lock them.

   

    ?We’re here to stop these jaguar forests being destroyed and the land turned into a genetically engineered soya desert,? said Emiliano Ezcurra, Biodiversity Campaign Coordinator, Greenpeace Argentina, speaking from the Yungas forest. ?Every hour, a forest area the size of twenty football fields is cleared in Argentina. Important ecosystems are destroyed, people lose their homes and livelihoods and wildlife is endangered,? he added. (2)

   

    Together, the Yungas and Great Chaco form the second largest forests in the Americas, after the Amazon. They are rich in biodiversity and home to rare species, such as jaguars, which are on the edge of extinction in the region. (3)

   

    Argentina is the world’s third largest soya producer and it’s biggest soya exporter. Increasing global demand for soya has led to an increased demand for agricultural land in Argentina, at the cost of the last third of the country’s native forests. For every additional three tonnes of soya produced in Argentina, a hectare of forest is lost. Soya expansion is also leading to deforestation in Paraguay, Bolivia and southern Brazil.

   

    In Argentina, this rapid expansion in soya production has escalated since 1996, when Monsanto introduced genetically engineered soya beans. This is leading to social as well as environmental problems. The Yungas and Great Chaco forests are home to millions of people, including indigenous communities, who depend on them for their livelihoods. Soya ‘barons’ are paying local police to forcibly evict people who live in these forests from their land, often at gunpoint (4).

   

    Ram?n Ferriera, who lives in the Great Chaco forest, said: ?They force us to leave our land, often with guns. Then they come with these powerful machines, knock down all the trees, burn them and plant soya. We see no economic benefit from such great destruction and we lose all we have.?

   

    Ezcurra concluded: ?People go hungry while their land is used to grow soya to feed cows, pigs and chicken in Europe and Asia. This environmental and social abuse is totally unacceptable. The Argentinean Government must stop the forest destruction and give people who live in the forest the legal right to their land.?

   

    Greenpeace will stay in the area for several days. It will continue to peacefully confront forest destruction, visit threatened communities and document the areas that are under threat.

   

    Contact:

    Emiliano Ezcurra, Biodiversity Campaign Co-ordinator, Greenpeace Argentina, +54 911 510 94 104

    Oscar Soria, Communications Director, Greenpeace Argentina, +54 911 546 70694

    Daniela Montalto, Greenpeace International campaigner, +31 6520 91960

    Matilda Bradshaw, Greenpeace International media officer, +31 6535 04701

   

    Greenpeace is inviting people around the world to help save Argentina’s forests by contacting their Argentinean Embassies, to demand that the Argentinean President, Dr. N?stor Kirchner, stops the forest destruction. See www.greenpeace.org

    For briefings on the forests, their wildlife and the growth of genetically engineered soya industry in Argentina see http://www.greenpeace.org/international_en/press

   

    Images available:

    Satellite photographs that show the rate of deforestation in some of these areas is four times the world average -

    Contact: Naomi Camara, Greenpeace International picture desk +31 646 162019

    Photographs of today’s action, including aerial shots -

    Contact: Noemi Camara, Greenpeace International picture desk +31 646 162019

    Video footage of today’s action, including aerial shots -

    Contact: Michael Nagasaka, Greenpeace International video producer, +31 6 46 16 63 09 or Oscar Soria, Greenpeace Argentina on +54 911 546 70694

   

    Notes:

    (1) Argentina is planning to grow 14 million hectares of soya this year. 98% of it is genetically engineered and over 90% - almost 20 million tonnes - is exported as animal feed to Europe and Asia. Europe accounts for 35% of Argentina’s soya exports and China for 23%. See Argentinean Secretariat of Agriculture, Livestock, Fishing and Food

    (2) Forest Map of Salta Province, updated 2002. Management Unit of the Forest Assessment System. Secretary for the Environment and Sustainable Development, page 17.

    (3) The Great Chaco American forest covers a million square kilometres, across Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia and Brazil. The Yungas forest, also known as the ‘Clouded’ or ‘Mountain’ rainforest, is located in Argentina alone and covers about seventy thousand square kilometres. Both forests are home to jaguars.

    (4) Reported by MOCASE (Peasant Movement of Santiago del Estero Province, July 2003). Indigenous people and ‘campesinos’ have never been given title deeds to their land by the authorities, despite the fact that they have been living and working in these forests for decades. All the land is State owned. Local authorities often sell it to private owners. Since the indigenous people have no title deeds, they have no legal way to defend their land. Many move to the cities looking for work and end up in living in poverty in the growing slums.

   

   

   

   

   

   

   

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