Day 286 - 24 Oct 96 - Page 18
1 route as it was opened up for cattle ranching.
2
3 And she said in terms of -- she remembered it was the
4 Bordon trucks going down to Campo Grande that she
5 personally saw - on page 5 - forest being cut down by
6 Bordon employees and gathered evidence from peasant
7 families that they had been forcibly evicted from their
8 plots by Bordon employees. This was in Acre. So she
9 seemed to have had quite extensive experience and research
10 on this subject.
11
12 I think I have nearly finished Sue Branford's evidence. I
13 will not go into Mr. Monbiot's evidence, partly because it
14 is very, very clear and his statements were very, very
15 clear as well. So ----
16
17 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Do not ----
18
19 MR. MORRIS: ---- if you going to look at that, I do not need to
20 really go through it.
21
22 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No.
23
24 MR. MORRIS: I know that he did go further in his evidence.
25
26 As regards Fiona Watson, again I think the picture is very
27 clear. And her view was backed up by Sue Branford who
28 concluded it was impossible for -- Sue Branford, as you
29 will notice when you go through, included the conclusion
30 that it was impossible to be buying beef in Mato Grosso do
31 Sul without buying from land that belongs to indigenous
32 peoples.
33
34 MR. JUSTICE BELL: There is just one matter - you need not take
35 long about it - that you might help me on there. It is
36 quite clear that many of these indigenous people live
37 largely from hunting and fishing and they did that over a
38 vast area and quite a few people would cover a very large
39 area. Does that mean that you cannot develop any part of
40 that large area because it is said to be occupied by those
41 indigenous peoples, or would you not go as far as that?
42
43 MR. MORRIS: Well, I mean, partly it is a bad thing to be
44 destroying natural vegetation.
45
46 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It has nothing to do with that at the
47 moment. It is just the displacement of indigenous people.
48 If you have got maybe a few hundred people who habitually
49 wander over thousands of square miles catching what they
50 can, do you say it is displacement if you take any part of
51 it, or is it more focused than that?
52
53 MR. MORRIS: I think that part, if not the major problem with
54 the colonisation of indigenous people's areas, is that the
55 colonisation has the character of being a destructive one.
56 If people were respecting the environment and the forest
57 habitats, then there would not be the same kind of
58 devastation of the indigenous people's culture and
59 livelihood, so it is taken on ----
60
