Day 309 - 03 Dec 96 - Page 63


     
     1        Miss Bensilum on one side for a moment -- whose evidence is
     2        adduced on behalf of your clients, say that cattle came
     3        from areas which were deforested in the 1950s and 1960s you
     4        say that cannot be referring to rainforests, it must be
     5        referring to some other kind of forest?
     6
     7   MR. RAMPTON:  Yes, that is right.  According to what we now know
     8        of the geography of Costa Rica -- and where the rainforests
     9        actually are, where they have always been, and Professor
    10        Janssen is probably the key to this -- because of the
    11        geography of the country, they are not on the Pacific side
    12        of the country.  Guatemala is slightly different, as
    13        your Lordship will have noticed.  That is what he says, and
    14        he is 100 per cent supported by that area handled for Costa
    15        Rica which, curiously enough, was published in 1970 which
    16        was the year that McDonald's arrived in Costa Rica.
    17
    18   MR. JUSTICE BELL: What is the status of that book?
    19
    20   MR. RAMPTON:  That is published by the United States, an arm of
    21        the United States government.  Dr. Carriere said that it
    22        was reliable as a source of information about Costa Rica.
    23
    24   MR. MORRIS:  I do not remember him saying that.
    25
    26   MR. RAMPTON:  He did, I have given the reference.
    27
    28   MR. MORRIS: He was quite critical about certain parts of it that
    29        were put to him, as far as I remember.
    30
    31   MR. RAMPTON:  It is one of those works which we say is an
    32        authoritative work of reference, and for this purpose it
    33        probably does not matter that it is published by an arm of
    34        the United States government but that probably helps, which
    35        falls within E, F and G although it is a foreign document,
    36        of our submission about this on page 20 of the written
    37        submissions.
    38
    39        It has the same sort of status, we would suggest, as, for
    40        example, the Surgeon General report or the World Health
    41        Organisation, something of that character.  Or the forest
    42        book, the fat forest book that is in the yellow file behind
    43        Mr. Kouchokus's statement which is published by the USDA,
    44        I think, the forestry service.
    45
    46   MR. JUSTICE BELL: If I can go to recycling and waste.  Meaning
    47        C, perhaps it shows the artificiality of trying to divide
    48        up into separate boxes completely, economic imperialism,
    49        destruction of the rainforest and recycling and waste.
    50 
    51   MR. RAMPTON:  I quite agree. 
    52 
    53   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  But meaning C, I would see as really more
    54        part of rainforest than anything specifically to do
    55        with-----
    56
    57   MR. RAMPTON:  Except for the bit about fast-food packaging
    58        materials, which is in the actual leaflet; that is the
    59        problem with it.  The leaflet does not distinguish between
    60        destruction of the rainforest and the environmental damage

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