Day 238 - 22 Apr 96 - Page 10
1 Brazil, Venezuela and Guyana. I have worked for Survival
2 for nearly six years and in that time have made three field
3 trips to Brazil each lasting 2-3 months where I have
4 travelled extensively in the Amazon and elsewhere. The
5 main focus of these trips was to visit indigenous
6 communities to assess and discuss with indigenous people
7 their concerns and problems".
8 A. Could I add there that another important element of a
9 field trip is to have contact and dialogue with Government
10 officials and lawyers who are working on specific cases of
11 Human Rights violation and I have done that.
12
13 Q. I am sorry, I interrupted you.
14 A. I said that another important element of a field trip
15 is to have contact also with Government officials and with
16 lawyers and with any other people concerned with indigenous
17 peoples' rights.
18
19 Q. When you visit indigenous communities, or you act on their
20 behalf, or lobby for them, whatever, do you meet with other
21 representatives of those?
22 A. Yes. Most definitely many communities have their own
23 organisation so you will meet with the delegates, whether
24 it is leaders, anyone who has been chosen to represent the
25 community, as well also meeting people who are not working
26 within the indigenous organisation. It is very important
27 to meet as many people as possible on the ground to
28 understand a situation and to collect testimonies.
29
30 Q. Continuing to read:
31
32 "Prior to my work with Survival, I worked on an ecological
33 project in the Amazon organised by the Royal Geographical
34 Society, London, and the Institute of Amazon Research
35 (INPA) Manaus. During this project I lived in the Amazon
36 state of Roraimi for 14 months. After the field phase I
37 returned to Britain and was responsible for researching for
38 an education pack on the Amazon based on the project's
39 research and aimed at GCSE. This won the gold medal at the
40 Geographical Associations Annual Awards in 1993.
41
42 Cattle ranching in the Amazon has had an extremely negative
43 impact on a number of indigenous peoples in the region
44 known as Amazonian Legal. It is, in fact, one of the most
45 important causes of rainforest destruction and the invasion
46 of indigenous peoples' lands in the Amazonian rainforest as
47 a whole."
48
49 Can I just clarify something. Would you claim to be an
50 expert on environmental matters such as forests?
51 A. I would not claim to be an expert, but I know quite a
52 lot about it having worked with many scientists who are
53 experts on the environmental impact.
54
55 Q. We have other people who can speak to that?
56 A. Right.
57
58 Q. "It is, in fact, one of the most important causes of both
59 rainforest destruction and the invasion of indigenous
60 peoples' lands in the Amazonian rainforest as a whole. The
