Marc J. Dourojeanni is the leading Amazon expert in the world and has been at the forefront of academic and field reasearch in the Amazon for decades. He’s published several Books
Recently we caught up with him and asked 7 key questions about the Amazon, its main threats and what we can all do to help protect it.
1. What do you think everyone should know about the Amazon rainforest?
The conventional answer is probably that everyone must be aware of the importance of the Amazon region regarding planet’s ecological equilibrium (climate change) or to be aware of its importance as repository of the largest part of world’s biodiversity. However, the key fact to be known about the Amazon is the rapidity of its disappearance. Currently no less than 30%, most probably around 40% of the Amazon has been denuded of its original forests and certainly much more than 80% of the region is affected by severe biological degradation. All forms of contamination of water and soils by urban development, oil and gas exploitation, mining or agriculture, as well as overfishing, overhunting, logging, forest fires, etc. are destroying or downgrading every patch of the Amazon. Not even one thousand individuals can still be properly considered as Indians. A simple look at any Google Earth image can confirm most of these facts.
Only strictly protected areas still ensure whatever wilderness is surviving and, considering their abandonment by most governments it is unlike they will survive much longer. The so-called indigenous reserves of Brazil and of other countries are large but are already being destroyed by Indians themselves attracted by “progress” and “development” promises and submerged under an ocean of external pressures and temptations.
2. What is the one bit of science from your field (Amazon) that you think everyone should know?
Those that are concerned about ecology in the Amazon are often considered as anti-developers and even as antisocial or as romantic and utopian. However, most ecologists and environmentalists are not against economic and social development. They know that it is indeed possible to conciliate nature conservation and development, truly benefiting mankind. They claim for a little bit of order and discipline, as example simply by obeying the legislation of every country. Existing legislations of countries such as Brazil, Peru or Colombia are largely enough to simultaneously avoid the worst case scenario of Amazon destruction and to allow considerable economic growth. Legislation prohibits destroying forests in lands that are not suitable for sustainable agriculture. It is prohibited to kill Indians, to hunt or fish without licensing, to extract timber without forest management plans, to invade protected areas, to pollute rivers, to extract gold or other minerals without authorization, to build roads or dams without serious environmental impact assessments.
However, everywhere, everyday and in every country legislation is violated by individual citizens, corporations and by governments themselves. Legislation is often simply “para Inglés ver” (“for Englishmen to see”) an expression very common in Brazil to explain that the law or the prohibition is not to be respected… It is only to make gringos believe that the country is civilized or as “advanced” as any other or because such rules are requested by international organizations or international agreements.
Underdevelopment is a characteristic of societies that live without order. Nowhere else in South America underdeveloped behavior is more evident than in the Amazon. The Amazon is the new Wild West or “wild east”, depending from where in South America you look at it. It is still common for regular citizens to consider it as a place to conquer and exploit, as in colonial time.
3. The Amazon Rainforest concerns the whole of the humanity. Nine countries share this vast area. Who should be responsible for its conservation, Brazil, Peru, French Guyana? Shall we look it as whole or as different regions?
Theoretically the countries that are owners of the Amazon shall be fully responsible for its wise management and conservation. Of course, this is wishful thinking. These countries or, better said, these nations, are far away from any interest regarding conservation of the Amazon. A mix of geo-policy, economic considerations, interest groups, deep ignorance of facts and rampant corruption transform any intent of rationalization of the use of the Amazon space and resources in a utopia.
Therefore, it is out of any significant probability to pretend that the nine Amazon countries will be able to conduct a development that is sustainable or endurable on the basis of setting aside a reasonable portion of the forests where these are essential for the water or carbon dioxide cycles or for other ecological requirement. It is equally unviable to imagine that other nations will assume the task of saving the Amazon. Not only because the Amazon nations will not allow such an intervention but also because the developed nations are consumers and indirectly and often directly responsible for Amazon destruction.
Altogether, national and international efforts to promote sustainable development in the region are important. Many million dollars are being spent every year to do better in the Amazon. These efforts are intended to empower local populations to practice sound agriculture, sustainable forest management, agroforestry, etc. or are oriented to have more and better managed protected areas. However, all these effort are peanuts if compared with investments intended to exploit oil or gas, mining, timber or to promote export agriculture of commodities such as soybean or cattle. Only in Peru as much as 80 billion dollars are already proposed to be invested in the Amazon region in the next 20 years or so, in form of investments for exploitation and correspondingly required infrastructure (roads, railways, hydro-energy, waterways, urban development, airports, etc.).
– ‘Marc Jean Dourojeanni‘
The last part of the question refers at if the Amazon must be looked at as a whole or region per region. The answer is that both looks are necessary. The Amazon is an ecological unity from over 4,000 meters in the Andes down to the Marajo Islands in Brazil and, also, from the Guyana’s and Venezuela in the North down to the limits of the Cerrado and the Pantanal in southern Brazil. Most problems are common to every part and the interrelationships are enormous. However, each country’s Amazon is also different, especially in terms of social, economic and policy contexts. Moreover, especially in Andean countries the problems are very different at each altitudinal gradient. This is why in Peru, the “Ceja de Selva”, “Selva Alta” and “Selva Baja” are considered very different regions but, for ecologists, there are over 20 ecological zones relatively easy to distinguish from each other. Sustainable development solutions must be adapted to each one of these zones.
4. Who or what is the most dangerous factor threatening the Amazon Rainforest right now?
This question has been already answered. But, it is worth to insist. The main factor threatening the Amazon jungle is the Amazon nations lack of social discipline. In different wording, despite most illustrated people in the Amazon countries are aware of the negative consequences of what is going on, they are unable or unwilling to change the course. They may even realize that it is possible to develop and progress in social and economical terms saving a very large portion of the Amazon; a situation that will retro-nourish development. But lack of order, expressed in a copious legislation that no one obeys, in institutions that are ineffective and in lack of concerted national or regional planning, are giving room to chaotic investments that respond to particular private national or international interests but that are not related to the benefit of the majorities. Ignorance of those that are the first victims of this chaos, making them to applaud what is fatal for their future, add easiness to unscrupulous investors always and corrupt policy-makers.
From a different perspective the current main threat to the Amazon is Brazil’s very aggressive economic expansion policy. In addition to what Brazil is doing in its own territory, almost every infrastructure being proposed and built in Peru’s Amazon is related to Brazilian consultancy and building enterprises, Brazilian finance institutions, Brazilian Government and Brazilian growing needs of energy and minerals, as well as their effort for easy access to Pacific Ocean ports. Three roads, several railways and waterways as well as oil, gas and mining exploitation and several large hydropower plants are exclusively responding to Brazilian public or private interests. Peruvian, Colombian, Ecuadorian and Bolivian Amazon development is being planned in Brasilia and in Sao Paulo. Brazil is officially conquering its neighbors through huge investments and international agreements, but it is also doing so illegally, by facilitating the invasion of imprecise but large numbers of “caboclos” (poor farmers) and “garimpeiros” (gold and precious stones diggers).
5. What problem do you hope politicians will have solved by the end of the century in terms of laws?
The Latin-American countries need to reconstruct their legal bodies from scratch. Even more, they need to reinvent themselves, beginning with their own constitution in search for a much better democracy. Legislation in this continent is a mix of antiquated European laws with barely adapted copies of modern legislation from abroad. Latin-Americans always proudly claim to have “the most advanced”, the “most detailed” legislation but they never care about the viability of its application and, indeed, law-makers in this continent are uninterested in law enforcement by governments. Legal bodies that require million dollars to be implemented are produced without any consideration for its financing. Considering underdevelopment realities of each country, many legal bodies especially those regarding environment and social issues, are basically inapplicable, even assuming some authority is really intending to use them: A “perfect law” that is useless but enough to claim glory in international forums.
In addition, basic laws such as those related to mining, energy, water, forests, wildlife or environment are being changed at a high speed, never giving time for its effective implantation. The reasons for changes are often that some of its articles are not being applied or, if applied, they are creating difficulties for investments. Every year the congresses of countries such as Peru produce over 20,000 legal texts, most of them partially modifying existing basic laws, creating a monumental confusion.
Underdevelopment is much related to the false impression of democracy that South American countries offer. There are, indeed, periodical general elections at national,
regional and local levels, and no one is in prison for publicly expressing ideas or views that are contrary to the government or to mainstream. But there is no democracy when you have no choice of right people to elect, when people’s voice is not listened, when there is nothing like a minimum of transparency or when key decisions are taken without any possibility of public participation. An example of these facts is a government that can govern without problems despite having less than 10% approval (as in Peru). All decisions regarding the Peruvian Amazon are taken in Lima, the capitals of the country. When local consultation is mandatory, as for environmental licensing, the enterprises or the governments mount a parody and obtain approval without any difficulty. A few illiterate farmers must provide opinion on complex matters regarding hydropower plants or the characteristics of a new road. Previously they “may obtain the information in the Internet”, usually several hundred pages of hard to understand documents posted a couple of days before the meeting.
6. What is the most common misconception about your work?
When defending a sound balance between development and nature or a wiser use of natural resources you become the target of those that have no consideration for the environmental and social impacts of their ventures. Governments that support the conventional economic growth use all their influence and machinery to defend private investors against public protests or against academic exercises that prove something is wrong or something is false. To defend natural
Governments aren't doing enough to protect the Amazon | Image © Enrique Ortíz
resources, indigenous people or to pretend that a small percentage of the Amazon be free of conventional development makes of you a kind of public enemy or, a sort of anarchist. As mentioned, they do not send you to jail but they simply totally ignore your claims and, if you insist, they distort and ridicules your views or even block your possibilities to access the large public though television or other mass communication media. In addition, the very low educational level of Amazon nation’s majorities transform most population that is not directly affected in absolutely indifferent to what happens or is proposed for the “far away Amazon region.
7. What do you think is our role as common citizens to protect endangered lands and species?
It is clear that an educated and well informed citizenship is better able to fight government or private sector behaviors such as those mentioned in previous topics. An educated population will also elect better governments and will be very attentive to effective fulfillment of electoral promises. The lack of public interest in Amazon affairs or in environmental matters in South America is reflecting of the very low quality of public education at all levels. The school and even university information about the Amazon is the same that was relatively true some half a century ago: an enormous empty space or wild portion of the country that is covered of wonderful forests plenty of savage Indians and dangerous animals. Most people in these countries never read a newspaper and they rarely watch news in their televisions. They are axed on soft operas, football games, religious propaganda, action films and animated designs. Therefore, common citizens of the Amazon countries do almost nothing to demand their governments to protect samples of the nature. Even worst is the fact that urban citizens of the Amazon, such as those living in Manaus or Iquitos, are no better acquainted with the reality of the region where they live than those citizens of Sao Paulo or Lima. They never look at their surroundings. However, they take decisions on behalf of those living in the rural areas or in the woods.
