biofuels and begging

Here is a letter I have just wrote to Bristol City Council opposing a proposed biofuel powerstation near the city. I thought I would share it.

I wish to object to W4B’s planning application to build a 50 MW biofuel power station at Avonmouth Docks, which would burn 90,000 tonnes of vegetable oil every year.

I have been working in Colombia since September 2008 and see daily the impact of monocrops, such as palm oil, have both on people and the environment. Just two days ago I had a really intense sad experience that, above all, is what is motivating me to write to object to this biofuel plant. Waiting at the traffic lights on route to an event about Climate Justice here in Bogota, the captial of Colombia, an old man approached my taxi. He was dressed as smartly as he could, dark suit, a tie and a felt hat, but he didn't look like your average suited man., his clothes while clean and tightly ironed were old and shabby. And his old, sunweathered face, that makes guessing ages very difficult, showed such a sadness. He held a carefully handwritten sign in his hand, "Please help my family, god bless you. We are displaced from the Magdalena Medio”.

The Magdalena Medio is a low lying tropical region through which the river Magdalena flows. The relationship between paramilitarism and african palm is clear. In the Magdalena Medio the african palm expanded after the paramilitary takeover of the region. The paramilitary takeover of the region, through violence and the threat of violence, caused massive displacement, the result of which is thousands of old men like this begging at traffic lights. The fear of violence meant that opposition to palm oil projects has been small, and those who have opposed it live at risk.

In April 2009 I attended the funeral of Edgar Martinez, a farmer on the banks of the river Magdalena and community leader, who was killed after leaving a meeting with the mayor San Pablo. He strongly spoke out about the impacts of palm oil plantations on his farming community and opposed new palm plantations. The murder of Edgar is not an isolated case, but a systematic repression of those who try to oppose monocrops becuase of the damage to the environment, their culture and their livelihoods.

Palm from the Magdalena Medio is exported to Europe and the USA for both use in cosmetics, food and biofuels. Since the beginning of September, the network I work with has been accompanying a village which was violently evicted by riot police at the orders of a palm oil company which sells to the Body shop.
www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/13/body-shop-colombia-evictions

If the use of palm oil grows in Britain, people will continue to be violently evicted from their homes and forced to urban areas to beg at traffic lights.

Bristol City Council must consider the impacts of planning decisions, not only in Bristol but globally and take a lead in acting responsibily to protect lives wherever they may be. If this biofuels plant is granted planning permission, it is very likely that it will contribute to yet more violent displacement for Colombian people. Thus I ask you to reject this development.

If you feel motivated to write a letter and right  now (as decision day is Tuesday) go to : biofuelswatch action page 

In recent months Biofuel power plant applications have been rejected in Newport, Weymouth and London. Could Bristol be a fourth?

Important world matters: G20 and a child´s views

“Today I really missed you as I thought of affinity and so I go with you in mind. I will be thinking of you and the people you have met as grounding force when I am on the streets.”

Email received Monday from a dear friend as she sets off to London for the G20 protests.

In La Casa de la Red we have been keeping up to date with the protests in London. I want to give a damming critique of how, irregardless of what outcome the G20 come up with, capitalism is crisis. I see it so painfully on the streets of Bogota everyday. 300 people arrive in Bogota every day, the majority fleeing the violence, the violence imposed to re order land use, to control it so it can be handed over to one of thousands of the multinationals. I see old men, old women, men with kids, young women always always politely begging with the utmost respect. I don´t know how they keep their spirit, faces ignoring them for days after days, invisibilising them, my face turning away. Yesterday I physically kicked out, frustration, powerlessness filled me.

The moral argument goes that this economic crisis is set to increase unemployment causing misery for faceless people (in Colombia unemployment due to increase this year from 40% to 60%) so governments must do something. Yet this is a blinkered take on it, (or I could say, a historically and politically decontextualised view, if I want to use a snippet of the language of experts so I am taking more seriously. I have been reading the Times to see what the elite/my parents are thinking about the G20. The Times, exempify a problem with the UK elite: the constant rational, pseduo scientific arguments that only with those with access to high levels of education can engage with

.

Arguments won before even made due to invisible privilige. Arguments then used as tools against those with visible non-privilige. I ´m not going to use my privilige today to read, intellectually think in order to engage with The Times articles about supposed benefits of the G20 decision on the twistedly-named ´developing´ countries . Nor let myself be made to feel shit by their supposed superiority of knowledge on important world matters. I have a story of importance. It is about a little girl called Lorelia.

I met Lorelia last week in the sierra of the sur de Bolivar. The adults were deep in working groups debating and fine-tuning the community standards (normas de coexistencia) that they are creating for their region. Once they have been approved by a general assembly the government must legally recognise them as autonomous community laws.

Lorelia had earlier won a game I had set a group of kids and her prize was some of the fruit salad that those of us struggling with rice and yuca three times had made. As we sat and ate together I asked if she knew what the adults were talking about, if she knew what normas were. I asked if she had any suggestions for what could change in her community to make life better for her and other children. She sure did. This seven year old told me about incidences; fights with broken bottles injuring kids, drunken drivers, rubbish being thrown everywhere (normal everywhere in Colombia but exciting to hear a kid criticising this culture), people being killed, and she easily translated these experiences into suggestions for changes. I created a political space for her within the assembly and she presented her contributions for the community standards. She was confident, articulate, awesome, inspiring.

There is a disturbing parallel between this story and government get togethers: marginalisation where both people and cultures deem certain people to be important and ignore the rest. Yet, everyone, irregardless of their education and ability to participate, has a right to participate in the shaping of policies that will affect their lives. Fortunately, Fedeagrominisbol, the Small scale miners federation, is progressive, that is they listen, learn and grow in their political processes. It was not a struggle to create a space for Lorelia and I´m confident that spaces for participation of children will grow.

With governments, marginality is a deeper rooted problem. With governments in the current period, marginalising of social organisations and the absolute centering of business is the norm. People protesting in London are creating a space in which a different philosophy can exist. Fedeagrominisbol are building a federation with the strength to defend their cultures, not a static culture, but one that is changed by the communities in ways like what I witnessed with las normas de convivencia, rather than changes made through state and para-state violence imposing a ´development´ model on them.

While Fedeagrominisbol cannot participate in the protests against the G20 and talking about people in London representing people from the Global South I hugely problematic, there is a misty familiar reflection across the pond.

At a time when my blog had begun to feel more like a habitual routine, I really feel a reaffirmation of my commitment to encouraging cross pollination of stories across borders and cultures. So more people may take strength in walking with others beside them. So Lorelia knows that up on the bleak sierra in the rains there are people elsewhere also taking responsibility and collectively figuring out ways to create and defend alternatives to this fucked up violent injust robot.

My racism that allows new futures for Gabo.

Five days in the hot tropical city of Barranca Bermeja where spanish words are harder to catch - muffled by the constant whirl of fans hanging precariously above us. The smell of yet more roast chichen wafts from the Mac Pollo restaurant over the road yet different from Bogota - at 35degrees every breathe feels strained.

A pattern of breakfast, meetings, lunch, siesta, meetings, sitting around in the hotel reception, dinner, bed is quickly established . Nothing visibly powerful to do or see.

Gabriel's (Gabo) story - the warm, funny, dedicated man who I accompanied - assures me that my presence is powerful. Here is his story.

"We moved to Sur de Bolivar in 1971, when I was 21. Before that we lived in Calda but there was already many small scale farmers and not much land. We found land in an area that was not occupied and we settled there. We were looking for a place where we could have a better quality of life.

There were 10 families to begin with and many more people started arriving from different regions. By 1998 there was around 1000 people living in the community.

When our children started to grow up we built a school. We found teachers who had a high level of education that meant every child could get a good education. We also started building good paths, and later, roads (35km’s worth) around the community and to other villages.

A normal day for me was to work from 6am to 6pm. I grew yuca, plantain and rice. I also looked after the cows and pigs. This was my life, my passion, mi gusto. For me this proves that things that appear impossible can become real when we work communally.

Then the paramilitaries entered the region in February 1999, just one hours walks from my farm. Over the next few years we organised 8 marches - in the municiapl towns and the Capital of the region – demanding our rights were respected and that the paramilitaries leave the region. I was singled out as an organised and so had to leave the farm.

I stayed in the region until 2007, moving between different places, supported by different communities, with my wife and young daugher. At times we had to walk for 25 days in order to leave the region to report murders.

What I saw wasn’t fair, what was happening. They were killing the young people, old people. There was masacares all over the region. I was not going to work on the farm any more, instead dedicate myself to social work, building up people’s skills, organising.

When the paramilitaries were there I could hide but now the army have arrived I can’t hide in the region. One has to understand that within the army are the paramilitaries so the army does not mean you have security.

Before the arrival of the paramilitaries, the army already disappeared, tortured, killed. There was so many reports made about this that they had to change their strategy. And so the paramilitaries entered – they could do the brutal things.

What we now understand is that people were killed and disappeared because other interests appeared in the region, interests of multinationals.

They killed my son, they disappeared another. Brother of my wife was also disappeared. My son was killed on the 22 Sept 2002 in El Pairaiso, the army disappeared my second son in the middle of May 2005.

I’m not one to cry too much but everything that happens to you, your family or to your neighbour or friend, it reinforces your work. And you begin to understand who is the enemy.

The debate around the Law for Victims (that we went to on Thursday) to me is very dangerous as it supports impunity. It can’t ignore why we are victims, who benefitted from us becoming victims. The truth wil be when the state recognises that what has happened is a project of the state.

The land has to be taken away from the paramilitaries, from the multinationals and people can return to their territories. They must return my land, my house, and that they leave us in peace.

Those who are guilty must pay. But the guilty is not the person who shot, he is not the enemy, he probably didn’t know why, he was just ordered. Those who give the orders - they kill.

Now my wife and I live in the flat of my daughter in Bogota. We are looking for some land, as we are campesinos. I would like to live in the Sur de Bolivar but it is not possible. To go there I need to have accompaniment but this isn’t possible all the time so a bit of land near Bogota would be good."

The fact of my place of birth and my skin colour means that Gabo can return and work in his region. He knows that the political costs of disappearing him are raised higher with the presence of the likes of me.

I am strategically using racist structures - ones which make clear that my life as a white European is worth more than a brown Colombian. And as I do, I am complicit with racism. This is difficult. How do I ensure I don't reinforce a sense of European superiority over the Latin American's with the people I meet. Perhaps I can't - they will read my body as they choose. But I can think about how my behaviour, mannerisms, ideas, words might be interpreted by the people I am with, and with this I can try to walk a sensitive path.