Plantations, poverty and power - Critical Information Collective

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Botnia, of course, denies the impacts and issues statements such as this:
“All of Forestal Oriental’s plantations have received FSC certification
There are no rain forests in Uruguay
Only planted eucalyptus is used for pulp production” 339
What Botnia does not mention is that the consultants responsible for the IFC studies and the FSC
assessment (carried out by SGS Qualifor) failed to listen to what rural people are saying about the
plantations. In its EIA, Botnia didn’t even look at the plantations. IFC’s Cumulative Impact Study notes
that: “The EIA Study prepared by Botnia did not address specific impacts relating to plantations.” 340
While IFC noted this omission, it did nothing to remedy it.
IFC’s consultants point out that Forestal Oriental knows that its fast growing tree plantations have an
impact on stream flows. In 2000, Forestal Oriental hired a South African consulting firm, CSIR Division
of Water in South Africa, which found that Forestal Oriental’s eucalyptus plantations resulted in reduced
stream flows by an average of around 25 per cent. Nevertheless, the study concluded that as long as the
plantations did not cover too large an area in a given watershed the impact should not be a problem.
Whether CSIR spoke to any local people about the problems is not documented in IFC’s Plantations
Annex. IFC’s consultants make no mention of any discussions with local people. 341
While FSC certification should include taking local people’s problems into consideration, SGS failed to
do so. Even when its assessors talked to local people SGS avoided dealing with what they told them. One
villager told SGS that “the eucalyptus plantations consume a lot of water that in the long term can affect
neighbouring populations.” SGS’s response was to explain that “The area is subject to prolonged
droughts affecting the water table,” and that Forestal Oriental is carrying out a study into the impacts of
plantations on water.
In April 2006, World Rainforest Movement published a study written by Ricardo Carrere. The study is
based on a visit to the plantation areas by a team of WRM researchers and interviews with the people
living there. 342
Residents of Algorta (Río Negro), told WRM’s researchers that “because of the eucalyptus trees the
Arroyo Negro stream dried up, it used to be the town beach.” Forestal Oriental, Botnia’s plantations
company, owns plantations in this area.
A farmer in Guichón whose land is now surrounded by plantations owned by Forestal Oriental,
complained that as a result of the plantations the Boyado stream, which runs though his farm, has
completely dried up.
SGS’s public summary of their assessment of Forestal Oriental’s plantations fails to deal with the impacts
339 “Botnia’s Fray Bentos pulp mill project”, Botnia, Company presentation, May 2007.
340 “Annex B: Plantations”, International Finance Corporation Cumulative Impact Study, prepared by Ecometrix
Incoporated, September 2006. http://www.ifc.org/ifcext/lac.nsf/Content/Uruguay_Pulp_Mills_CIS_Final
341 “Annex B: Plantations”, International Finance Corporation Cumulative Impact Study, prepared by Ecometrix
Incoporated, September 2006. http://www.ifc.org/ifcext/lac.nsf/Content/Uruguay_Pulp_Mills_CIS_Final
342 Ricardo Carrere (2006) “GREENWASH: Critical analysis of FSC certification of industrial tree monocultures in
Uruguay”, World Rainforest Movement, April 2006. http://www.wrm.org.uy/countries/Uruguay/book.html