On 25 January 2019 a huge tailings dam at the Feijão iron ore mine, near Brumadinho, in Minas Gerais, Brazil, collapsed suddenly and catastrophically. The resulting wave of toxic sludge engulfed part of the mine workings, a packed workers' canteen, and rushed down into the Paraopeba river, washing away houses, cattle, mine personnel and people living close...
Drawn up without any proper consultation, or local participation, the so-called Emergency Plan was used by the developers to keep Indian people well away from the construction site. They set up offices in Altamira to dole out payments in kind, inducing the Indians to travel frequently to the city and alienating them from their traditional home environment.
In a book released by the Comissão Pró-Índio de São Paulo this week, the affected population reveals the socio-environmental consequences of 40 years of bauxite extraction in Oriximiná, Brazil.
The book “Antes a Água era Cristalina, Pura e Sadia – Percepções quilombolas e ribeirinhas dos impactos e riscos da mineração em Oriximiná, Pará” discusses the consequences of bauxite extraction from...
This is the final post in a series of four written for Christian Aid and LAB by distinguished journalists João Peres and Moriti Neto
4. Company policy: Divide and Rule
MRN, or Mineração Rio do Norte, the bauxite mining company which dominates the extractive industry in Pará, improved the process of 'stakeholder mapping' in 2015, according to the company's financial report....
This is the third in a series of four blog-posts, written for Christian Aid and LAB by distinguished journalists João Peres and Moriti Neto
3. David vs Goliath
one public document states that since 1995, the aluminium mining company MRN (Mineração Rio do Norte) has been transferring R$495,000 per year for the maintenance of the local unit of the Chico Mendes...
This is the second of a series of four blog-posts, written for Christian Aid and LAB by distinguished journalists João Peres and Moriti Neto
2. Conservation: double standards
The lands sought by quilombolas and the mining company, Mineração Rio do Norte (MRN) belong to the federal government, which means they are 'public', but not entirely so. In 1979, president João Figueiredo,...
With the bancada ruralista mining / agribusiness lobby in control of the Temer government and Congress, a Brazilian company, Intertechne Consultores, sees it as an opportune time to revive a shelved plan to build dams in the Amazon’s Aripuanã basin.
The company has asked federal officials to allow viability studies for 3 new dams in this very remote,...
Brazil’s president has until 22 June to approve or veto two bills (PLC 4 and PLC 5) turning over more than 600,000 hectares (2,317 square miles) of federally protected Amazon forest to illegal loggers, illegal miners and land thieves.
The measures, initiated by Temer and already approved by Congress, are seen as a reward to the bancada ruralista...
Na terceira de seis postagens, uma discussão sobre os problemas dos colonos (barragens, legislação ambiental, grileiros) e uma visita a uma fazenda “fantasma”.
Tradução: Maria Luíza Camargo. A matéria original, em inglês, pode ser lida aqui no LAB ou aqui no Mongabay. Aqui, a primeira e a segunda postagem.
Publicado originalmente em inglês em 23 de março de 2016.
Em janeiro de...
Na segunda de seis postagens, Sue Branford fala de uma área onde a criação de uma unidade de conservação ambiental coloca comunidades tradicionais sob o risco de perder o território onde vivem há gerações.
Tradução: Maria Luíza Camargo. A matéria original, em inglês, pode ser lida aqui no LAB: ou no Mongabay.
Em janeiro 2016, a jornalista britânica Sue...