Mauricio Macri (Photo courtesy of Mauricio Macri)

Mayor Mauricio Macri’s decree in defence of the freedom of the press and freedom of expression is being debated today in the city legislature.

Helio Rebot will chair the Commission for Constitutional Affairs meeting during which Macri’s decree will come under scrutiny.

Although the decree has already been published, the commission will establish whether or not it should in fact be in force, or whether it should be rejected by the legislature in the coming month.

The emergency decree, signed on 14th May, aims to “guarantee the protection of journalists and the media throughout all of Buenos Aires.”

It also puts forward the idea that Argentina’s capital ought to operate within a specially created legal jurisdiction, allowing it to intervene in affairs which endanger freedom of expression.

Rebot opened the meeting with the following: “If it is ratified, this decree will be about more than Macri, it will protect future journalists, whatever their opinion.”

The emergency decree has also attracted strong opposition. Their arguments range from suggestions that the decree is unconstitutional and lacking in legitimacy, to those who hold that it was done specifically to favour the interests of media conglomerate Grupo Clarín.

In a dialogue with state news agency Télam, Juan Carlos Dante Gullo of the Frente Para La Victoria party stated: “In principle the decree violates our federal spirit, articles of the constitution, and, unfortunately, forces us to engage in discussions about the privileges one business, and that business is called Clarín, instead of engaging with projects which benefit our citizens and those citizens who live in the capital.”

City legislator María América González went on to say “this decree a null bill. It attempts to supersede national legislation, something which is forbidden in the constitution.”

Despite its critics, the move has seen support in the province of Córdoba where governor Juan Manuel de la Sota enacted a similar bill last Friday. It seeks to circumvent any actions which “restrict, alter or censure” freedom of expression.

In a similar vein, Friday saw a group of journalists sign a document that rejected any intervention at all on the part of the State in its affairs. The Argentine Association of Journalistic Entities (ADEPA) meanwhile published a document that contained a robust support for the decree.

Poison by design by Valley_Photographs, on Flickr

Brazil has been named a world-leader in the use of toxic products in farming, with new research finding that the country’s agriculture industry currently uses 10 products that are widely banned in other countries.

According to the study by the National Health Surveillance Agency (ANVISA), an organisation created in 2002 to monitor the use of toxic products, Brazilian farmers are currently using 10 substances which have been banned throughout the US, the European Union, and other countries.

For example, the country’s agriculture uses the insecticide Methamidophos, which has been banned within the EU, China, India, and Paraguay, amongst others. Talking about the use of this chemical, Rosany Bocher, co-ordinator at the National System of Toxic-Pharmacology, said “we are consuming the junk that other nations reject”.

Additionally, the pesticide Endosulfan is one of the widely banned products of which, according to the Ministry of Foreign Trade, Brazil imported 1,840 tonnes in 2008, and in 2012 the figure rose to 2,370 tonnes.

Toxic agricultural products that have not been banned counts as the fourth most prominent cause of poisoning in the country. In 2008, 6,200 cases of poisonings were recorded caused by these substances, which can cause long-term liver, hormonal, and neurological illnesses, as well as reproductive problems and cancer.

Mexico’s Secretary of Agriculture, Enrique Martinez y Martinez (photo courtesy of Aguascalientes government)

Mexico’s Secretary of Agriculture, Enrique Martinez y Martinez, announced in a press conference yesterday that organised crime and economic setbacks have inhibited agricultural production throughout the country.

In the meeting, he presented a new goal for food security, which included raising the percentage of food grown and consumed in the country from 57 to 75%.

“What we have now is a dependent development, so we continue depending on the business of the US and on imports when we have the capacity in our country to produce all the food the population needs,” he said, according to Mexican magazine Proceso.

Martinez y Martinez said that obstacles that have hindered production in the country include financial problems, insecurity from the ongoing drug war, and the effects of global warming.

“There are producers who would produce more if not for the risks that are experienced in the country, both in ranches in the north, centre, and in Bajío,” the secretary said of drug violence.

He also said the biggest problem in Mexico is that its economic model focuses “more on stabilising than on growing.”

In conclusion, Martinez y Martinez announced President Enrique Peña Nieto’s plans to make major reforms to the Mexican countryside and its food production. He called on legislators to support a more productive and sustainable industry through the proposed reform.

Oscar Di Vincensi, an Argentine journalist for the newspaper PerteneSer and radio station 94.1 Punto Cero, was admitted to a provincial hospital with respiratory problems on Wednesday after inhaling the agrochemical pesticide glyphosate in the countryside surrounding the provincial city of Alberti.

Di Vincensi was confronting the president of the Rural Producers of Alberti and owner of Fumigaciones Zunino, Juan Manuel Zunino.

“Why are you fumigating, Zunino? It’s prohibited to fumigate here”, Di Vincensi can be heard asking in a video he recorded of the incident.

On 15 December the Supreme Court of the Province of Buenos Aires reversed a ruling by the Criminal Appeals Court, making it illegal to fumigate within 1,000 metres of residential areas. The incident in Alberti, located southwest of the capital, took place within 50 metres of the town itself.

After telling Di Vincensi that he was on private property, Zunino proceeded to fumigate the area, spraying the journalist in the process.

Glyphosate, a weed killer discovered by Monsanto scientist John E. Franz in 1970, is more commonly known in English as Roundup. Though generally considered low in toxicity and non-carcinogenic in humans, ingesting large quantities can potentially be fatal.

Fumigaciones Zunino is one of four companies permitted to fumigate in the area surrounding Alberti. Maria Zunino, the company owner’s sister, is Environmental Chief of the city.

On 10^th October, Miguel Galván was murdered, stabbed to death in the doorway of his own home. Almost one year earlier, Cristian Ferreyra had been shot and killed in his house. Both men were peasant farmers from the northern province of Santiago del Estero and members of the National Peasant Movement of Santiago del Estero – Farmers’ Way (Mocase-VC) an organisation which fights for the land rights of peasants and indigenous people.

Protest at Congreso to call for justice against the assasination of Miguel Galvan (Photo courtesy of Mocase-VC)

The reason for the men’s murders was that they refused to give up their land to multi-national soybean plantation companies. Whilst Galván’s attackers are yet to be identified, in Ferreyra’s case it is widely claimed that a large landowner from the area hired hitmen to remove him from his path.

In the six months after Ferreyra’s tragic death, incidents of conflict between large agribusiness and peasants decreased, but since then, the expansion of soy production has continued and so have the forced evictions of peasants and indigenous people from lands they have occupied for centuries.

Expansion of Soy and Agribusiness in Argentina 

In 1996, Carlos Menem’s government approved a law that granted farmers permission to cultivate transgenic soybeans in Argentina. The decision brought about a drastic and rapid change within the country’s agricultural sector. Argentina allowed for the cultivation of genetically modified soybeans without carrying out their own tests, instead using only those provided by the multinational agribusiness Monsanto.

Argentine farmland with monocrops. (Photo: Franco Vissani)

The economy was struggling and Menem sought large corporate contracts that could be seen as evidence of potential future recovery. Within a year, 11 million tonnes of soy were harvested from an area spanning 6 million hectares. Fast forward 15 years to today, and the entire country bares an alarming resemblance to a giant field of bioengineered soybeans. Argentina is the third largest producer of soy in the world and is responsible for one third of worldwide soybean sales. A staggering 97% of the soy harvested is exported worldwide.

Today soybean cultivation occupies more than half of Argentina’s productive land.  However, long before the arrival of the multinational soybean plantation companies, the land was largely farmed by local and indigenous peasants. In 1988, there were 422,000 small farms based in Argentina’s countryside. By 2002, this number had fallen by almost 25%.

Guillermo Neimann, a sociologist at the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO) who specialises in the area of rural employment, explains that “Argentina is not a country that has historically experienced large land conflict. It is only in the last few decades that it has appeared, with the arrival of large agribusiness”.

What had previously been a diverse and self-sufficient agricultural system was rapidly replaced with a model of virtual monoculture. As Brewster Kneen, author of Farmageddon, puts it, Argentines were “quite literally forced” to produce soy “in place of milk, meat, vegetables, and lentils which were once produced in abundance on the small farms which have now been overrun by large landowners growing soy.” Nowadays, lentils are imported from Canada whilst exports of Argentina’s famous beef decline annually. “That’s like Mercedes-Benz not exporting cars!” exclaims agriculturalist and member of the Grupo Reflexion Rural, Adolfo Boy.

Traditional small goat farming in Santiago del Estero is becoming more difficult to do. (Photo: Andres Lofiego)

Provinces in the northwest of Argentina, such as Santiago del Estero, were hit particularly hard. Soybean cultivation in the area increased by 48% between 1988 and 2002.

Violence and Evictions 

Henk Hobbelink, agronomist and co-ordinator of small farmers’ rights campaign group GRAIN, gave a speech last year in which he said, “today we are witnessing nothing less than the full frontal assault on the world’s peasantry.” Nowhere does this ring more true than in Argentina.

As big agribusinesses expand their soy plantations throughout the countryside, they encounter resistance from the local farmers who have cultivated the land for centuries. Thus, they employ certain methods to remove those who obstruct their path, the most extreme cases being those of Ferreyra and Galván. The land rights of indigenous communities that have been there for centuries are ignored.

According to Adolfo Boy, the eviction process begins when “groups of lawyers, or property developers, that know the land registry, forge papers, and turn up and tell the peasants that they are the owners of this land”.  He points out that beyond this, “there are paramilitary forces, thugs and police, all practically at the service of the expanding soy companies” who help finish the job.

The original land inhabitants and owners are left with two options: move to the slums surrounding the cities or submit themselves to the inhumane working conditions of life as an employee of one of the big agricultural companies. As Kneen puts it “one does not want to wonder how many of the ubiquitous garbage pickers on the streets of Buenos Aires were once small farmers”.

Laws: Present and Future

In a recent interview with Radio Mundo Real, Mocase-VC leader Cariló Olaiz, declared that existing laws that protect peasant farmers are not being enforced. He maintains that in the lead up to Galván’s death, the organisation informed local authorities in Santiago del Estero that the farmer was receiving death threats and that his life was in danger. “As in the case of Cristian (Ferreyra), we filed all the accusations and we even had a meeting with a judge in July. The government of Santiago del Estero was aware of this and did nothing to stop the armed gangs,” said Olaiz.

Mocase-VC blames the governor of the province, Gerardo Zamora, directly for Galván’s murder, given his lack of action in the lead up to it. They point out that on 3^rd October, the provincial government of Santiago del Estero issued a report that highlighted the dangers faced by small farm owners trying to protect their land on a daily basis. Despite their awareness of the dangers, no measures were taken to protect peasants and a week later Galván was killed.

A protest in Santiago del Estero organized by Mocase-VC and MNCI Argentina (Photo courtesy of Mocase-VC and MNCI Argentina)

Now the National Peasant Movement (MNCI), along with other peasant and human rights organisations are urging the government and Congress to pass a new law that will bring an end to the evictions. A UN human rights council declared itself in favour of the bill, which was first called for following the death of Ferreyra, but has been consistently delayed by authorities ever since.

Edgardo Depetri is one deputy who has pledged to do all he can to pass the law before the end of the year, but campaigners remain doubtful given the government’s history of slow progress when it comes to peasants’ rights. Neimann makes the point that “a law like the one protecting peasants from evictions is very important but it alone is not going to be sufficient. We need to improve the justice system, above all at a local level. Provincial governments need to understand that regulating the expansion of agribusinesses is vital”.

The Power of Monsanto

Monsanto is one of the world’s largest food production companies. It was Monsanto’s genetically modified RoundupReady soy (RR) that was approved by Menem in 1996. The RR technology allowed for soy to grow in arid areas, and in so doing greatly reduced the need for manual labour. Monsanto dominates the current soybean market in Argentina and is the driving force behind the corporate wave that is destroying peasant farming. Kneen offers a scathing verdict: “the clear and present danger is the corporate control of food, which is what Monsanto is clearly after. On this account, and because I despise its ruthless tactics, I do not hesitate to describe it as an evil company”.

The power that is held by the world’s largest food producers cannot be underestimated. Boy describes Monsanto as “a multinational that is capable of all types of corruption” whilst Neimann says that “it acts without any restrictions”.

Despite these traits, the Argentine government relentlessly pursue bigger and longer lasting deals with Monsanto and other big agribusiness companies. As recently as June of this year, president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner announced a new agreement with Monsanto. As part of her Agribusiness Strategic Plan (PEA), the president hopes to increase grain production by 60% to 160 million tonnes by 2020, 20% of which will be soy. Following the accord, president Fernández announced that she was “very happy because Argentina is now at the forefront of biotechnology”.

Whilst the revolutionary scientific developments made by companies such as Monsanto are undeniable, their products are not without faults. The exclusive use of RR has caused biotypes to disappear, weakened the soil, and made it less productive for future farming.

Rural populations have also been affected by the spraying of the herbicide due to its glyphosate content. Local doctors complain of higher cases of miscarriage, birth abnormalities, and respiratory dysfunction. As Kneen sums up “the danger may well turn out be genetic”. Not to mention the deforestation that has to occur in order to make way for the vast soybean plantations. The region of Santiago del Estero has shown one of the highest rates of deforestation in the world with an average of 0.81% of the forest torn away each year, compared with a global rate of 0.23%.

The Crop That Just Keeps on Giving

Though unpopular among human rights organisations, against a backdrop of record-high world prices for soy and other crops, the immediate economic gains of an industrial, concentrated agricultural model have so far dissuaded politicians from taking definitive action against it.

Silos of soy in the fields of Junin. (Photo: Nicolás Lope de Barrios)

Given the increase in global commodity prices, Neimann explains that soy production gave the government “the opportunity to enter the market in a way it never had before. Governments all over the world are trying to make the most of any opportunities they have in the commodities market”.

According to Boy, this is the reason why politicians sometimes employ a double standard. Officials do acknowledge that working conditions need to improve and that deforestation needs to be monitored, but yet they continue to ally themselves with the big agribusinesses.

Given the way in which international food companies are opting to persecute rather than coexist with small farmers, it would appear that Argentina cannot pursue biotechnology and simultaneously maintain a peasant farming model. Boy paints a bleak picture of the situation: “For the time being, nobody is going to break the soy model. It doesn’t matter what political party they are in, whoever comes in, is going to continue exactly as we are, because they all think the same. Not a single province or municipality is going to plant anything else. Nobody is thinking about local production or local development”.

In an interview with journalist Dario Aranda, Nobel Peace Prize winner Adolfo Pérez Esquivel interpreted the current situation as evidence of the fact  that the government “gives priority to economic interests over people’s lives”.

“It Will Happen Again” 

The expansion of soy production in Argentina has equated to the invasion of peasant and indigenous territory by multinational agriculture companies. Government policy is deliberately replacing peasant agriculture with an agro-industrial model driven by the needs of multinational corporations. At both national and provincial levels, they are enabling this to happen; they are either postponing or not enforcing peasant’s rights laws, and meanwhile people continue to be killed. Widespread deforestation is taking place and cultural and biological diversity is being destroyed.

Industry vs Nature. (image courtesy of Grupo de Reflexión Rural)

As Kneen puts it “agribusiness today exists to produce crops as a means to make money. It fosters the exploitation of people, land, and resources to produce crops to export and trade elsewhere”.

The international peasant organisation, Via Campesina, says that the expansion of soy is pushing Argentina’s small farmowners and their methods of production to the brink of “irredeemable extinction”.

“The current agricultural model is a way of farming without the farmer” says Boy. “Nowadays, politicians are not motivated by the same things we are; what has happened to us, the violence, the urbanisation, the displacement. Argentina is not a happy place. All this is because of the agricultural model”.

Following the recent murder of Miguel Galván, Mocase-VC released a statement entitled “It could have been avoided, it will happen again”. In light of the government’s recent activity regarding the new deal with Monsanto, and inactivity concerning peasant’s rights, it is hard to disagree.

Paraguay’s National Peasant Federation (FNC) announced yesterday that it would start to mobilise against the government’s recent decision to use genetically modified (GM) seeds for corn and cotton crops.

The measure was approved by presidential decree, after new president, Federico Franco, met with businessmen from the rural sector. Franco recently assumed power after democratically elected president Fernando Lugo was removed from power by parliament, in what many have called a ‘legislative coup’.

Their decision has been supported by other rural organisations, who have stated that the use of GM seeds will bring negative consequences for rural workers and their families, as well as the environment. As part of the mobilisation, the organisations are demanding that the multinationals and local businesses present their studies on food safety and the environmental impact of the grains.

President Franco has said that the import of the seeds would increase peasant families’ production of cotton.

The latest decision comes after the July decision to register a type of GM cotton produced by multinational Monsanto. The plant needs glyphosate to develop, a herbicide that has been banned in various places around the world for its high levels of toxins.

Brazil is projected to replace the U.S this year as the world’s top soybean grower. Joined by Argentina and Paraguay, these South American countries are projected to provide over half the global soybean supply next year. The price of soy, which is used for animal feed and fuel, is also expected to remain high because of a lower supply due to droughts in South America last year, and in the U.S. this year.

Droughts are currently destroying soy crops throughout the U.S, while South American farmers are predicting strong crops and abundant rains because of El Niño. This weather phenomenon warms waters in the equatorial Pacific and usually leads to heavy rainfall in the Southern Cone.

Due to such predictions, farmers in Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina are all expected to shift away from corn production and produce record amounts of soy. After a very successful winter corn crop, Brazilian farmers are prepared to dedicate this season to soy production. Argentine farmers are expected to plant about 20 million hectares, 1 million more than in the previous season, and Paraguayan production is predicted to reach a high mark of 8.1 million tons, according to Market Watch.

Meanwhile, in the U.S., experts have categorized the present drought as the worst since 1956 and expect very low corn and soybean production, as the global prices for both commodities increase due to tight supply, according to Reuters. Although some climatologists have suggested that El Niño won’t produce as much rain as expected in the soybean-producing South American countries, the current drought in the U.S. and the rising prices are making way for large-scale, record quantities of soy production in Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay.

Speaking on his radio and television programme “Aló Presidente” yesterday, Hugo Chávez, president of Venezuela, threatened the three biggest banks in the country’s private sector with nationalisation if they fail to finance the country’s agricultural production, “as they should”.

Chávez addressed Banesco, el Provinicial and Mercantil, stating that he had “no problem” with nationalisation”. Chávez specifically addressed Juan Carlos Escotet, president of Banesco: “If you cannot [respond to the demands of the agricultural sector], tell me how much the bank costs, and we will nationalise at once.” He also addressed vice-president and minister of land and agriculture, Elías Jaua, to organise a meeting with the bankers in order to discuss the issue.

Chávez insisted that he would rather work in conjunction and cooperation with the banks, but that if they failed to comply, measures were in place. He insisted that the banks must uphold the law and Constitution of the country, which received applause from his audience.

Private banks, according to Venezuelan authorities, often evade legislation in the agricultural sector, by only granting funds to the bigger producers in the agro-industrial department, therefore often missing out small producers.

The president added that this policy is the same for the construction of housing. Credits are transferred to a central government fund, and then the money is distributed where it is needed.

Chávez’s government has already nationalised the Bank of Venezuela, which was bought from Santander. The president stated that they could do it again with any institution.

Argentine government officials arranged for $2.3bn in loans to aid drought-stricken farmers using funds provided by banks on 26^th January.

The funding announcement comes on the tails of another $500m in loan money that Agriculture Minister Norberto Yauhar granted as part of the Agricultural Emergency fund.

A drought has struck several countries in South America including Argentina, and Argentina Agrarian Federation president Eduardo Buzzi said the loans include $1.5bn coming from the Banco Nación and $800m from the Banco Provincia de Buenos Aires.

“This will be insufficient because the losses are much greater,” Buzzi said, according to La Información.

In its 26^th January survey, the Buenos Aires Grain Exchange stated that although recent rains will help farmers, they won’t entirely stem the agricultural impacts of drought in the country.

The non-profit civil association released numbers stating that the country’s soybean production is expected to be around 46.2 million tonnes during the 2011/12 farming year. While last weekend’s rain did help push the number up, the estimate is still below last year’s harvest of 49.2 million tonnes.

“Both seasons experienced extreme conditions during December, with the difference that the 2010/11 campaign managed to catch up at the end of January under better conditions, with more frequent rains, more even distribution and more millimetres of water,” the report said.

Argentina is one of the world’s leading producers of soybean.

The country’s corn – another product that Argentina excels at exporting – is also at risk. The report noted that the rains during the last seven days gave relief to most productive areas of our country, but other were left dry.

“Just the southwest of Córdoba, the northeast San Luis and the western part of Santiago del Estero have had low rainfall to none, complicating the summer crop conditions,” the report noted.

Nísio Gomes, a Guaraní chief shot dead by gunmen (Photo courtesy of Survival)

Just days after losing their chief and spiritual leader in a deadly attack, members of the Kaiowa Guaraní tribe entrenched themselves in a makeshift camp on their ancestral territory now used for cattle ranching, vowing to uphold the last words of their lost leader.

“Take care of this land,” the 59-year-old chief Nísio Gomes reportedly said, before being shot multiple times by hooded gunmen and dragged away to a truck.

The Kaiowa, from the Mato Grosso do Sul state in south-eastern Brazil, is just one Latin American tribe that has had its land stripped away on the agricultural frontier. The challenge of protecting native groups is growing as food production escalates across the region.

In Argentina last month, security guards allegedly killed Cristian Ferreyra, 23, a leader in the Lule Vilela indigenous community in the province of Santiago del Estero. The tribe is fighting to keep ancestral land under threat from deforestation for soya farming.

Though not all murders are linked to land disputes, tension arises as farmers and ranchers seek to extend holdings for agricultural production, often contracting private security companies to intimidate indigenous communities that are defending their constitutional right to ancestral land, experts say.

Pushed off their land and frustrated with government inaction, tribes return to occupy what was once exclusively theirs, creating strife within the community and with encroaching businesses.

Evictions from their lands for biofuels and cattle ranching has forced the Guaraní to live on the roadside. (Photo courtesy of Sarah Shenker / Survival International)

Scenes of Conflict

The Kaiowa had been living in spare roadside homes as they waited for Brazil’s Indigenous Affairs Agency, FUNAI, to complete a survey demarcating the land to be returned to the Guaraní by April, 2010, according to Sarah Shenker, a campaigner at Survival International, an NGO dedicated to worldwide tribal rights.

After FUNAI failed to finish the survey, several Kaiowa returned to their land in early November, where they were met with threats from ranchers now on the territory.

According to eyewitnesses, on 18th November, some 40 armed men burst into the Kaiowa camp, surrounded Gomez, and shot him in front of his community. Two adolescents and a boy were also reported missing after the raid. FUNAI and federal police are investigating the incident.

The Guaraní, with a population of roughly 46,000 in Brazil, are under constant threat in the Mato Grosso do Sul state. A traditionally nomadic tribe, they are forced to live in relative confinement, experience a high suicide rate, and are malnourished, according to Schenker.

Brazil’s minister of human rights, Maria do Rosário, called Mato Grosso do Sul “one of the worst scenes of conflict between indigenous people and ranchers in the country”, and pledged material support for the communities.

Meanwhile, provincial authorities in Argentina have taken five men into custody, including the soya businessman José Ciccioli, in connection with the death of Cristian Ferreyra. Ciccioli allegedly hired three other men to carry out the crime.

The territory in Santiago del Estero is being deforested as soya farming balloons across the province: In 1995, soya cultivation in the province was a mere 94,000 hectares. Today the number is over 1.1m, according to statistics from the Ministry of Agriculture.

“Indigenous land is rich in natural resources, for agriculture but also for mining,” says Mariela Flores, a consultant with Argentina’s Secretariat for Human Rights and a representative of the Diaguita community in Tucumán.

Protest march against the death of Cristian Ferreyra organized by MOCASE, Movimiento Evita, Partido Obrero, Frente Darío Santillán and Quebracho

Land Pressures

Just as some communities are beginning to gain political recognition and reclaim territory, new agricultural production and land prices are soaring, making conflicts more intense, she says.

But the recent attacks are not new or isolated incidents. Hundreds of ongoing clashes and the prospect of ramped up agricultural production to meet booming global food demand likely means continued pressure on indigenous groups in Latin America.

Worldwide cultivable land is expected to expand by 5% – or 70m hectares – by 2050. Production will decline in developed countries and expand greatly in developing countries, especially sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, according to the Food and Agricultural Organization.

In addition, new technology has had an undeniable effect on the outward expansion of farmland. The conversion of Brazil’s Cerrado region – a once unproductive savannah slightly bigger than Mexico – and the use of transgenic crops and precision agronomy have allowed planting in areas not previously thought possible.

And while the new contours of the global economy put pressures on land, political powers often do little to relieve them.

The recognition of indigenous territory requires an agreement between the communal, provincial, and national authorities, says Flores, “which is complicated, because provincial governments tend to be feudal, favouring business interests and providing little representation for native communities.”

The constitutions of both Brazil and Argentina, as well as international statutes from the United Nations and the International Labour Organization, affirm the right of indigenous tribes to their native soil.

QOM camping on 9 de Julio and Av de Mayo protesting their treatment (Photo: Jessie Akin)

However, many tribes, such as the Qom de La Primavera, from the northern Argentine province of Formosa, continue to wait for action from the federal government. Last year, the Qom drew attention by camping at 9 de Julio and Avenida de Mayo – one of the busiest intersections in Buenos Aires – in protest at land usurpations and police repression in their province.

They eventually reached an agreement for access to health care and potable water. But threats against the tribe continue. The son and grandson of Felix Díaz, the Qom’s leader, were shot at last month while walking through their territory. No one was injured.

Cane Cutters

In Mato Grosso do Sul, sugarcane plantations are spreading to meet demand for ethanol-based fuels. The state’s governor, André Puccinelli, claimed in 2008 that “Mato Grosso do Sul will be the biggest producer of ethanol in seven years’ time”.

In 2008, there were 50 new ethanol projects seeking funding in the state, which would occupy roughly 800,000 hectares in coming years, according a report by Survival International.

Guaraní man harvesting cane (Photo courtesy of João Ripper / Survival International)

Many Guaraní end up doing the gruelling work of sugarcane cutters, with a work-life expectancy of just 15 years, according to the report.

“The completion of the survey and land recognition is paramount,” says Egon Heck in a telephone interview from Mato Grosso do Sul. Heck is a coordinator for the Indigenous Pastoral Council (CIMI) in Brazil, a group tied to the Catholic Church in defence of indigenous rights.

The government has been postponing the survey “for decades”, and has received strong opposition from agribusiness groups, he claims, leading to the desperate situation that tribes like the Kaiowa find themselves in.

Similarly, Argentina’s land survey, signed into law in 2006 and to be completed by 2010, was postponed until 2013.

“The killing of Nisio Gomes had surprising repercussions,” says Heck, noting that international media is starting to pay attention. “So hopefully we can raise awareness of the circumstances facing indigenous tribes, and those responsible for violence won’t be met with impunity.”