Day 068 - 16 Dec 94 - Page 45
1 accord with your evidence that you have given?
2 A. Can you say that again?
3
4 Q. The last sentence of the translation at the bottom, does
5 that accord with your evidence as to what you have been
6 told?
7 A. What you are saying is what I have said before, there
8 has been a cattle area, it has been a cattle area?
9
10 Q. Sorry. Never mind the 70 years, forget that. But that is
11 the region which -----
12 A. The region, Guanacaste? Yes, Guanacaste. I did
13 recognise that word.
14
15 Q. So what have you been told by Mr. Madrigal as regards where
16 they have been getting beef from since they started in
17 Costa Rica, or what the policy is in terms of the source
18 and Guanacaste?
19 A. Our policy is to use, as I said before -- let me take
20 that back -- not to use beef that will come from areas that
21 are rainforest, considered to be rainforest or recently
22 deforested areas, by your definition. That applies to our
23 policy. It is the same they are using here; it complies
24 with our policy. The Guanacaste area, it is not in the
25 rainforest.
26
27 Q. Have you been told that that is the only area?
28 A. No, I have not been told that is the only area. There
29 are other areas within Costa Rica that are cattle areas
30 that are in the dry forest, that is not rainforest.
31 I never said it was the only area.
32
33 Q. So it will use cattle from all over Costa Rica, as long it
34 is not from recently deforested land?
35 A. Or rainforest area; that is correct.
36
37 Q. Some of the Guanacaste region has been deforested since the
38 last 70 years; are you aware of that?
39 A. It is what I know, what I know, it is a deforested area
40 for more than 70 years, what I have been told. What I have
41 been told is that when the Spaniards came, when cattle was
42 introduced, it was in that particular area, because it is
43 suitable for cattle production, because nothing else of
44 agricultural value will grow there. The rainfall in that
45 area is between 60 to 70 inches per year. Rainforest
46 require 600 or more rainfall. So, it has been an area for
47 many, many years where cattle has been there.
48
49 Q. So if we look at the other letter of 1st January, 1992,
50 tab 81 ---
51 A. Which one?
52
53 Q. The last one -- it indicates, does it not, that there is a
54 region in the southwest that is being used, as well as two
55 regions in the northwest -- I do not know what they would
56 be -- and that these three regions were deforested in the
57 50s to 60s?
58 A. Sorry, was that a question?
59
60 Q. Have you got any response to that? This was in 1992.
