Day 158 - 19 Jul 95 - Page 27
1 MR. MORRIS: Yes. My recollection is that Brazil is the first
2 country that opened up outside the US, but I might have
3 that wrong. Anyway, if we go on to over the page, under
4 "Environmental impact", which is the second paragraph:
5 "Nearly all the deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon
6 (variously estimated at between eight and 12 per cent of
7 the forest area) is directly, if not always indirectly, the
8 result of cattle ranching. Ranching may, as stated above,
9 be the first cause of deforestation or it may be the final
10 cause, the ranchers clearing the land after it has been
11 opened by timber cutters or colonists."
12
13 Then we come to the middle paragraph starting: "A further
14 aspect: A further aspect is the clearance of cerrado
15 forest in states such as Mato Grosso for soya beans, much
16 of which goes to feed cattle in Brazil, the United States
17 and Europe. The cerrado is also highly diverse, and its
18 clearance leads to significant losses of biodiversity."
19
20 It is our belief that there are some areas to the south of
21 the Amazon Basin, the Amazon frontier, the Amazon region,
22 which includes cerrado forest which is also highly diverse
23 and its clearance leads to significant losses of
24 biodiversity, as stated there.
25
26 I did not want to bring in the whole of the soya bean issue
27 because I felt that needed to be tackled separately when
28 I have prepared properly on that.
29
30 He says: "Cattle ranching outside the Amazon is the
31 principal reason for the movement of peasants into the
32 Amazon". That is a direct reference in our pleading, in
33 our proposed pleading. "This is because so much land has
34 been taken over by cattle ranchers elsewhere in Brazil that
35 the forests are the only place available for peasant
36 agriculture. Land concentration in Brazil is extreme, and
37 most of the largest properties take the form of cattle
38 ranches. It is my opinion, as well as that of many
39 environmentalists and some government ministers in Brazil,
40 that the only means of stopping the flow of colonists to
41 the Amazon and the destruction of forests they cause there
42 is a massive programme of agrarian reform, with ranch land
43 outside the Amazon redistributed for more
44 productive peasant agriculture" and, by implication, not
45 cattle ranching.
46
47 Hence, the use of beef raised on ranch land outside the
48 Amazon region, which McDonald's have admitted, is the
49 principal reason, according to our expert, Mr. Monbiot, for
50 the movement of peasants into the Amazon. It would be
51 logical that the nearer the regions are outside the Amazon,
52 the nearer they are to the Amazon, the more likely, of
53 course, that the people will go into the Amazon, especially
54 if all the areas below them to the south are used for
55 cattle ranching which McDonald's say they are.
56
57 So here we have all the regions bordering the Amazon
58 region, according to McDonald's, four main regions which is
59 the Paraguay flood plain -- this is for Barretos -- which,
60 in fact, goes into Mato Grosso which, we would contend, is
