land conflicts

An outline of the impacts of soy monoculture expansion in Paraguay which causes the disappearance of rural communities as soy expansion is the main driver of the expulsion of Paraguayan campesinos by force or by the deteriation of their living conditions.

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Background article
Farmers struggle in Paraguay against expanding soy cultivation

The huge increase of soy fields is expulsing small scale farmers from their lands in Paraguay, but also in Brazil, Argentina and Bolivia. Some even speak about a soy-tsunami that is submerging farmer communities. The expansion of soy cultivation goes along with a widely spread violation of human rights. The production is mainly used as animal feed for the meat production in Europe and China. Recently also agro-energy increases the demand for soy and other crops.

Written by Arturo Peña, translated by April Howard: Pedro Silva is the active campesino leader from the Lima District, in the province of San Pedro, and member of the Provincial Coordinator in Defense of Sovereignty, a front that opposes the advance of soy monoculture in the area,. Silva was wounded last friday night in his house by two hit men of Brazilian nationality. Silva was hit with three bullets, two in the abdomen and one in the right arm. His recuperation, in the Emergency Medical Hospital in Asunción, was stable until today when a clot was discovered that could affect his lungs, due to which surgery will be needed. The family of Pedro Silva communicated that they will be needing blood donors in the next few hours.
To contact the Silvas to make a solidarity donation, please call Silva's son in law Benigno Acosta: 0981 636 932.

This book is a compilation of essays and investigations carried out by a network of Latin American activists and researchers. This compilation depicts the current status of the GLOBAL SOY MODEL that dominates the Southern Cone.
Javiera Rulli, editor of this compilation, defines the introduction of the soy model as a war against the population, the emptying of the countryside, and the elimination of our collective memory in order to shoehorn people into towns and convert them into faithful consumers of whatever the market provides. The impacts of this model go beyond the borders of the new Soy Republics. The dehumanisation of agriculture and the depopulation of rural areas for the benefit of the corporations is increasing in the North and in the South.

removing soy in Pariri ocupation
The land titles of the occupied lands in Pariri remain within the INDERT, the national land reform agency. The titles who where said to pass on to the cadaster which would mean an illegal transfer to Brazilian soy producers, for the moment being seems to be revoked. This sudden move is likely due to international pressure. The MAP has been
receaving numerous support letters.
Other positive news is that in the community of Tekojoja, this week they started to built houses after the community faced 3 violent evictions.

The multinational Syngenta Seeds is pressuring the Governor of the State of Paraná to expel the family farmers of the Via Campesina currently residing on the Free Land encampment with police force.

The 120 families occupied the área more than a year ago, in protest to the environmental crime committed by Syngenta. The multinational illegally cultivated genetically-modified soy and corn at the site, within the protective zoner of the Iguaçu National Park. The family farmers demanded that Syngenta pay the fine of US$ 465,000, imposed on the corporation by the IBAMA, the federal environmental agency. In November of 2006, the Governor of Paraná expropriated Syngenta´s site, and planned to turn the area into an agroecological research center.

We ask organizations to write personalized letters about the MAP ‘s situation to alert different Paraguayan institutions about the situation and pressure them to act. Letters are best written in Spanish, but English will work as well. Ideally, letters should be sent via email or fax to Paraguay and to the Paraguayan embassy in your country. It’s also important that a copy of the letter, with the names of the addresses, be sent to the MAP at agrariopopular@yahoo.es, so that the organization can keep track of the support it is receiving.

22 May 2007: The MAP (Agrarian and Popular Movement), a Paraguayan campesino organization, is in a state of alert and requires international solidarity. A camp of landless youths from Pariri is being threatened with eviction, and there is an attempt to frame and criminalize the organization’s national leader, Jorge Galeano.
How you can help? Click here

April 18, 2007, by April Howard & Benjamin Dangl: Rural eastern Paraguay used to be full of jungle, small farms, schools and wildlife. Now it is a green sea of soybeans. The families, trees and birds are gone. The schools are empty. The air is filled with the toxic stench of the pesticides like paraquat and 2,4-D used to protect the soy crops.
We drove through the sea of soy on a red dirt road. Meriton Ramírez was bringing us to the former community of Minga Porá, to the farm where his family used to live. Ramírez is a member of the Asociación de Agricultores de Alto Paraná (ASAGRAPA), a farmer's union spearheading the fight against the expansion of the soy industry.

In September 2006, the Movimiento Agrario y Popular (MAP), an organisation of small farmers and landless people from Caaguazu, Central Paraguay, finally gained a legal victory in a long battle. After several land occupations and consequent violent land evictions, the Supreme Court in Asuncion decided that INDERT, a public institution, had illegally sold land to Brazilian soy producers. The MAP formed a local political party to protect the interests of peasants in a corrupt and increasingly repressive political environment. Jorge Galeano, co-founder of the MAP, was interviewed shortly after the elections.

In Paraguay, currently less than 2% of the population owns 70% of the land. The expansion of GM soy is now one of the main causes of land conflict, and consequently one of the principal reasons for the increasing number of landless peasants. Caaguazu is one of the frontier areas of soy expansion. The town of Vaqueria can be considered as the front line of the peasant resistance against the agro-industry.