Day 241 - 26 Apr 96 - Page 54


     
     1        year, yes.  If we turn to the following page.  It may be
     2        worth noting that this includes the map which we have
     3        served from Dr. Cotter.
     4
     5   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Yes.
     6
     7   MR. MORRIS:  I will read the first full paragraph and the next:
     8
     9        "Similar situations occur throughout Central America.
    10        Rather than recognising tropical rainforests as valuable
    11        natural resources, many central American politicians view
    12        them as obstacles to national development.  Not only do
    13        they fail to conserve nationally owned forest land, but
    14        they also provide legal and financial incentives to peasant
    15        farmers and cattlemen to colonise and clear these forests.
    16
    17        "In many of the central American countries, in order to
    18        gain title to a plot of federal forest land, the colonising
    19        individual must simply 'improve' it by clearing it of
    20        vegetation.  Because individuals can obtain generous loans
    21        from government and commercial banks to raise beef cattle,
    22        they simply transform the rainforest into pastureland.
    23
    24        "By any of these methods of converting forest to pasture,
    25        the end result is the same.  After seven to ten years of
    26        beef cattle yields, the effect of over grazing and
    27        torrential rains turn the rainforest nutrient poor soils
    28        into eroded wastelands.  When this happens, the rancher
    29        must find new crop land or rainforest to transform into
    30        pasture.
    31
    32        "In these various ways beef cattle producers are expanding
    33        their operations throughout the rainforests of Central
    34        America, and destroying the forests' wild life and
    35        agricultural production with equal disregard".
    36
    37        Then I will leave the rest of the page, save for the last
    38        complete sentence which is about eight lines up starting
    39        "Thus, in Costa Rica".  It is the last complete sentence
    40        on page 15:  "Thus, in Costa Rica, where 71 per cent of all
    41        new farm land is planted in beef cattle pasture, beef
    42        production doubled between 1959 and 1972, but per capita
    43        beef consumption fell from 30 pounds to less than 19".
    44        That is in the context of the production is increasing but
    45        local consumption is decreasing.
    46
    47        Actually, I continue to read that:  "In Honduras, between
    48        1965 and 1975, beef production jumped by almost 300 per
    49        cent, but national per capita consumption dropped from 12
    50        to 10 pounds.  By most estimates, at least two-thirds of 
    51        Central America's arable land is now dedicated to cattle 
    52        production, yet the region's per capita beef consumption 
    53        continued to decline.
    54
    55        "Behind this illogical situation lies a simple fact the
    56        expansion of Central America's beef cattle production is
    57        largely a response to the lucrative beef import market in
    58        the United States.  As beef cattle production expands in
    59        Central America, beef exports expand accordingly".
    60

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