organization:wrm

Day of Real Forests: A Photo Essay
▻https://towardfreedom.org/archives/environment/day-of-real-forests-a-photo-essay

https://towardfreedom.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/4.top_.jpg

Monoculture tree plantations like these eucalyptus farms pictured here from South Africa are a big threat to forests and a driver of deforestation. Unlike natural forests which are biodiverse and provide a habitat to a web of life of many species of plants and animals, these monoculture plantations support barely any life. These are typically large-scale intensively managed plantations with endless rows of only one species- mostly exotic fast-growing trees like pine or eucalyptus among others, destined for industrial production of commodities like paper or palm oil. They suck the groundwater up, leaving barely anything for animals and people living nearby.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization considers such plantations to be forests, on a par with real forests (as its definition of forest only considers tree cover and height rather than the other critical functions). But people around the world are demanding that the UN reconsider its definition and stop incentivising commercial plantations which have been expanding rapidly under the guise of “reforestation” and “forest restoration” at the cost of real forests.

#forêt #plantation #définition #biodiversité

Eucalyptus and silent poisons: The expansion of plantations in the southernmost part of Bahia, Brazil | WRM in English
▻http://wrm.org.uy/articles-from-the-wrm-bulletin/section1/eucalyptus-and-silent-poisons-the-expansion-of-plantations-in-the-southernmo

#Eucalyptus plantations designated for pulp production involve the covert use of agrochemicals. Agrochemicals are chemicals that—along with other substances and products—were re-purposed from their original military functions following the two world wars. Explosive materials turned into synthetic and nitrogenous fertilizers; lethal gases became agrochemicals; and war tanks were transformed into tractors (1). Thus, in the second half of the twentieth century, the Green Revolution was launched with the promise to increase agricultural production as a means to end hunger. What is not clear is how tree plantations, such as eucalyptus, can help end hunger—since trees cannot be eaten!

#plantation #Brésil #agro-industrie

How does the FAO Forest definition harm people and forests? An open letter to the FAO | WRM in English
▻http://wrm.org.uy/other-relevant-information/how-does-the-fao-forest-definition-harm-people-and-forests-an-open-letter-to

In September 2015, during the XIV World Forestry Congress, thousands of people took to the streets in Durban, South Africa, to protest against the problematic way in which the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), insists on defining forests (1). The FAO definition considers forests to be basically just “a bunch of trees”, while ignoring other fundamental aspects of forests, including their many other life-forms such as other types of plants, as well as animals, and forest-dependent human communities. Equally, it ignores the vital contribution of forests to natural processes that provide soil, water and oxygen. Besides, by defining ‘forests’ as only being a minimum area of land covered by a minimum number of trees of a minimum height and canopy percentage, FAO has actively promoted the establishment of many millions of hectares of industrial tree plantations, of mainly alien species, especially in the global South. As a consequence, only one particular sector has benefitted: the tree plantation industry. Industrial tree plantations have been the direct cause of many negative impacts on local communities and their forests; which have been well-documented

#forêt #plantation #définition #confusion

Civil Society Resistance Against Aviation Grows – 38 Organizations Call for Real Solutions Against Climate Change | WRM in English
▻http://wrm.org.uy/actions-and-campaigns/civil-society-resistance-against-aviation-grows-38-organizations-call-for-re

The aviation sector is the world’s fastest growing greenhouse gas emittor and one of the most polluting sectors. Nevertheless, no real solutions to address this climate problem are put forward so far. Instead, the aviation industry is planning to greenwash their growth strategy.

38 organizations, among them Attac, Friends of the Earth International, La Vía Campesina Europa, Transnational Institute, Fern, and several groups struggling against airport construction projects, therefore support the global petition “No to aviation growth! No to false climate solutions!”.

#transport #aviation #climat #résistance

DRC: Communities mobilise to free themselves from a hundred years of colonial oil palm plantations | WRM in English
▻http://wrm.org.uy/articles-from-the-wrm-bulletin/section1/drc-communities-mobilise-to-free-themselves-from-a-hundred-years-of-colonial

Oil palms are native to the forests of Central and West Africa and inseparable from the region’s peoples and their cultures. Communities in this part of the world have relied on oil palms for thousands of years— as a source of food, textiles, medicines and construction materials.

Most of the world’s oil palms, however, are cultivated far away, in Southeast Asia, and not in forested palm groves, but on massive #monoculture #plantations where tropical forests used to stand. These oil palm plantations are a product of Europe’s brutal colonial legacy.

When the European colonizers invaded Central and West Africa during the nineteenth century, they came to understand (in a very narrow way) the possible wealth that could be generated from oil palm cultivation. They began taking over the local people’s large oil palm groves and tearing down forests to set up plantations. One of the pioneers of this effort was Britain’s Lord Leverhulme, who, through a campaign of terror against the local people, took over community palm groves and turned vast swathes of the Congo’s forests into slave plantations. His company’s oil palm plantations would eventually expand throughout West and Central Africa and then to Southeast Asia, and provide the foundation for the multinational corporation #Unilever, one of the world’s largest food companies. Unilever sold off its global oil palm plantations about a decade ago but to this day it remains one of the world’s biggest buyers of palm oil.

...

After 100 years in what is now the DRC, Unilever sold three of its oil palm plantations in 2008 to a company called #Feronia, registered until recently in the Cayman Islands. This company, listed on the Stock Exchange in Toronto, Canada and now majority owned by European development funds, had no previous experience in agriculture. Through its sale of these DRC plantations, Unilever made around USD 14 million dollars in cash and left behind around USD 10 million dollars in liabilities to the new owners.

#industrie_palmiste #esclavage #colonisation #exploitation #terres

La « compensation biodiversité » va-t-elle affamer les populations des pays du Sud ?
▻http://www.bastamag.net/La-compensation-biodiversite-va-t-elle-affamer-les-populations-des-pays-du

Le débat parlementaire sur la loi « pour la reconquête de la biodiversité, de la nature et des paysages » arrive à son terme. Une troisième lecture du texte est en cours à l’Assemblée nationale jusqu’au 23 juin. Parmi les sujets les plus discutés : les « obligations de compensation écologique ». L’idée : contrebalancer la biodiversité perdue à un endroit en protégeant celle qui risque d’être détruite ailleurs. Un rapport du Mouvement mondial des forêts (World Rainforest Movement, WRM) et de l’ONG Re:Common, (...)

En bref

/ #Eviter_le_dépôt_de_bilan_planétaire, #Politique, Biodiversité, #Afrique, #Alimentation, #Droit_à_la_terre, (...)

#Biodiversité #Capitalisme

La « compensation biodiversité » va-t-elle affamer les populations des pays du Sud ?
►https://www.bastamag.net/Insecurite-alimentaire-dans-les-pays-du-Sud-la-face-cachee-de-la-compensat

Le débat parlementaire sur la loi « pour la reconquête de la biodiversité, de la nature et des paysages » arrive à son terme. Une troisième lecture du texte est en cours à l’Assemblée nationale jusqu’au 23 juin. Parmi les sujets les plus discutés : les « obligations de compensation écologique ». L’idée : contrebalancer la biodiversité perdue à un endroit en protégeant celle qui risque d’être détruite ailleurs. Un rapport du Mouvement mondial des forêts (World Rainforest Movement, WRM) et de l’ONG Re:Common, (...)

En bref

/ #Eviter_le_dépôt_de_bilan_planétaire, #Politique, Biodiversité, #Afrique, #Alimentation, #Droit_à_la_terre, (...)

#Biodiversité #Capitalisme

La « compensation biodiversité » va-t-elle affamer les populations des pays du Sud ?
►http://www.bastamag.net/Insecurite-alimentaire-dans-les-pays-du-Sud-la-face-cachee-de-la-compensat

Le débat parlementaire sur la loi « pour la reconquête de la biodiversité, de la nature et des paysages » arrive à son terme. Une troisième lecture du texte est en cours à l’Assemblée nationale jusqu’au 23 juin. Parmi les sujets les plus discutés : les « obligations de compensation écologique ». L’idée : contrebalancer la biodiversité perdue à un endroit en protégeant celle qui risque d’être détruite ailleurs. Un rapport du Mouvement mondial des forêts (World Rainforest Movement, WRM) et de l’ONG Re:Common, (...)

En bref

/ #Eviter_le_dépôt_de_bilan_planétaire, #Politique, Biodiversité, #Afrique, #Alimentation, #Droit_à_la_terre, (...)

#Biodiversité #Capitalisme