Deforestation of indigenous lands still increasing around Ocho Sur oil palm plantation in Peruvian Amazon

 

This study confirms the first spike in deforestation recorded by the community between 2012 and 2013. This was precisely when Plantaciones Pucallpa acquired the land that had been taken from the indigenous community by invaders, and began growing oil palm.

 

Plantaciones Pucallpa was founded by the Czech-American businessman Dennis Melka, whose “Melka Group” of agribusiness companies are accused of deforesting more than 13,000 hectares in Loreto and Ucayali, both in the Peruvian Amazon.

In 2012 alone, FPP identified 2,744.5 hectares of deforested land, almost five times the entire area of forest lost in the eleven years prior (587.1 hectares between 2001 and 2011).

Despite this, 2013 was even worse, with 3,290.1 hectares of forest recorded as having been lost. The deforested areas were subsequently used to establish oil palm plantations.

It was around this time that Santa Clara de Uchunya started making official complaints about the land grabbing in their territory, as well as the relentless attacks and intimidation by workers and land traffickers linked to Melka's company.

Although deforestation fell slightly in 2014 and 2015, levels remained higher than they had been prior to 2011, before the arrival of Plantaciones Pucallpa.

In September 2015, the Ministry of Agriculture issued the company with the first order to immediately cease its intensive farming operations, having confirmed that it was operating without an environmental certificate.

By that time the company had already deforested more than 6,800 hectares, despite not having a relevant land-use environmental certificate. Plantaciones Pucallpa disregarded the order and continued its operations.

A second spike in deforestation

The study conducted by FPP found that, from 2016 onwards, levels of deforestation again began to grow exponentially, from 753.8 hectares of forest lost in 2016 to 2,920.2 hectares in 2019.

This figure makes 2019 the second worst year on record for deforestation in Santa Clara de Uchunya’s ancestral territory.

Tom Rowley, Mapping and Monitoring Officer at FPP, who led the study, told Servindi that the geospatial distribution of this second spike in deforestation suggests that this was an organised effort.

“The most recent spike seems to be smaller, more generalised and with more fragmented deforestation, but the way the roads and deforested areas radiate out parallel to the plantation seems to be at least somewhat coordinated,” he explains.

Rowley adds that the aerial photographs gathered as part of the study, “show permanent structures along some of the roads, which also suggests that more organised and intentional land grabbing is happening.”

Unlike the first spike in deforestation recorded in 2012 and 2013, during which forest loss was only identified on one front, Rowley notes that this time the forest was being levelled in disparate areas of the community's territory.

“The forest loss seems to be happening everywhere at once, which is surprising,” he tells us.

Following the findings of this recent study, SERVINDI spoke to indigenous leaders from the Santa Clara de Uchunya community who confirmed, looking at the facts, that the deforestation of their territory has not stopped and that it is actually increasing.

“Just a month ago, a group of land traffickers came here and we couldn’t get them to leave. The deforestation, which started with the arrival of this company [Plantaciones Pucallpa], continues to increase from one day to the next. We live in fear because there's no security,” Efer Silvano Soria, chief of the indigenous community, told SERVINDI.

Like Silvano, Carlos Hoyos Soria, former chief of Santa Clara de Uchunya, still remembers how different his community was years ago.

“Before this company came here, no one was interested in even one square metre of our community’s lands, so we didn't have any problems. But the company’s arrival brought with it greater interest, and widespread land grabbing and trafficking like we're seeing now,” the indigenous leader told SERVINDI.

 

“It's all a game to them. First they take the land, and then they get a possession certificate  and register it with the public registry. Once they have the land title, they start to negotiate with the company directly.” – Carlos Hoyos Soria

 

For Hoyos Soria and the rest of the community leaders, there is no doubt that Plantaciones Pucallpa – which changed its name to Ocho Sur P in 2016 – is behind the land traffickers who enter the community's land by force, take control of it and then sell it to the company.

“It's all a game to them. First they take the land, then they get a possession certificate and register it with the public registry. Once they have the land title, they start to negotiate with the company directly. It's all orchestrated by the company,” the Shipibo leader explains.

Also relevant to the recent study is the fact that in the midst of this second spike in deforestation, in 2017, when the oil palm company was already operating under its new name, it was again ordered to cease its predatory operations, this time by the courts.

An attempt at land grabbing

The FPP study found that, since the company was ordered to cease its operations, the deforestation of the community’s land has not only failed to fall, but it has increased considerably.

For Rowley, this may be more than a coincidence, considering that the pattern of forest loss and road building in the area indicates a level of coordination and technical resources that seem unlikely without the company having at least some involvement.

“Based on the overall picture, the pattern of forest loss forms a kind of rectangle alongside the oil palm plantation, which,” the specialist suspects, “could indicate an attempt to grab the adjacent land in an effort to expand.”

The indigenous leaders are convinced that this is the aim of the land traffickers who invade their community, explains Miguel Guimaraes Vásquez, president of FECONAU [Federation of Indigenous Communities of the Ucayali].

“The aim is for the land invaders to come in first and then the land ends up in the hands of the company. That's their strategy,” Guimaraes tells us.

The company’s arrival has not only encouraged and accelerated land trafficking and deforestation, but it has also increased the distress and insecurity of the local community, who are threatened for defending their territory.

Hoyos Soria, chief of the community between 2016 and 2019, tells us that during this period outsiders twice came into his community and tried to shoot him dead; while Guimaraes reports that he has received death threats from someone on an unknown number, forcing him to change his own number.

Concern is spreading throughout the community. Its members see that, despite the years passing, the constant official complaints and the orders to cease operations, not a single authority has been able to put a stop to the activities of Ocho Sur P, the company responsible for the current situation in the eyes of the indigenous leaders.

The leaders tell us that throughout the national state of emergency the company has continued to operate and has even intensified its activities, making the most of the complete lack of oversight by the authorities during this period.

Even more disturbing is the fact that everything seems to suggest the company is continuing to operate at the expense of its workers' health. In June, the website Convoca.pe revealed that 90% of workers tested at Ocho Sur P tested positive for COVID-19.

 

“At this rate it seems likely that this will be one of the worst three years recorded [for forest loss], if not the worst” – Tom Rowley, FPP’s mapping and monitoring expert

 

Rowley explains that during the lockdown imposed in March 2020, the rate of forest loss in the ancestral territory of the Santa Clara de Uchunya community increased by 35% compared with the same period in 2019.

At this rate, “it seems likely that this will be one of the three worst years recorded, if not the worst,” warns the FPP expert.

The facts pose an obvious question: Can deforestation on such a scale really go unnoticed by the relevant authorities?

Guimaraes cannot answer this. He is concerned that his Indigenous kin in Santa Clara de Uchunya, tired of asking for justice, will take matters into their own hands.

“This company has completely destroyed the community's way of life, but at the very least they want to recover their land. In Santa Clara de Uchunya they’re saying that if no one gives them justice, they will take it into their own hands. We want to avoid a tragedy,” Guimaraes says, concerned.

Although Santa Clara de Uchunya's future is uncertain, it is clear that what happens next is in the hands of the authorities charged with determining who is behind this second wave of deforestation. It is now time for them to take action.

Update: Following the publication of this article, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) granted a public hearing to a group of indigenous and civil society organisations in Peru. The hearing on corruption and the violation of the human rights of indigenous defenders from the Amazon area was held on Tuesday, 6 October 2020. Among others who presented the cases of their communities was Efer Silvano Soria, community chief, on behalf of Santa Clara de Uchunya.