TIGblogs TIG | TIGblogs GROUP TIGBLOGS LOGIN SIGNUP
Environment
Environment
Notícias do Velho Chico
Translations available in: Portuguese (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | English | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

Notice of the Old Chico
Automatically translated into English thanks to WorldLingo
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Sun, 18 May 2008 10:46:54 GMT
Server: Apache
Set-Cookie: JSESSIONID=58A54352699395020F2CB242F6D2A1A4.lv1-25; Path=/
X-WL-ERRORCODE: 1176
Content-Length: 9840
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/plain;charset=iso-8859-1

Movements define routes of the fight against the transposition of the river San Francisco
In Sobradinho (BA), about 200 representatives of social organizations reaffirm the popular fight against the megaempreendimento of the government Squid

03/03/2008

Clarice Tavares and Maria Luisa Mendonça,
of Sobradinho (Bahia)
Text are in circulation in the REJUMA (Net of Juventudade for the Environment)

Although to have little rained this year, it has signals of spring in the hinterland northeastern. Road that takes the Sobradinho is full of flowers, that sprouts yellow, purple, white and rose, as they were announced welcome to the caravans that had come all of the northeast and other regions of the country for the Conference of the Peoples of the San Francisco and Half-Barren, of 25 the 27 of February. This was the first moment of reencontro of the movements that had been mobilized during the strike of hunger of D. Luiz Cappio, who lasted 24 days and finished in 21 of December of 2007.
As encaminhamentos: popular fight and the construction during all the year, congregating the diversity of entities and regions. One more time it is reaffirmed the contrary position to the project of water transposition of the river San Francisco and everything what it represents. “It has a deepening, I feel that the movements had gained a new impulse and are giving a positive reply in the direction to search ways to point for where we go to walk and with that forces we go to count”, said the bishop Luiz Cappio (It reads the Letter of Sobradinho with the definitions signed for the organizations).
It affirmed that “unhappyly the government wants to carry through the workmanship to any cost”, but still said to believe that the super project will be plus a fallacy against the popular will and that “does not have to be concluded” because of the economic implications “, social, ethical and ambient”.

The bishop was 24 days in jejum, at the end of the year past, against the project of transposition of the river San Francisco. During the act the social organizations and popular movements had idealized the organization of the Conference. The place chosen for accomplishment, Sobradinho (BA), all symbolizes the process of degradation evidenced with the presence of the hidrelétrica and barrage, surrounded of mazelas and people in misery situation.

North-eastern water
During the three days of lectures, debates and plenárias, some data had called the attention the participants, about 200 people more than 90 social organizations and popular movements, as the numbers presented for the engineer Manoel Bonfim, who already was managing of the Company of Development of the Valley of the San Francisco (Codevasf) and the National Department of Workmanships Against Seca (DNOCS).
One of most important studious of the region, the professor Manoel Bonfim explains that “it is lie to say that north-eastern it does not have water”. According to it, in Brazilian Half-Barren, it rains more than what the world-wide average for this type of bioma. The problem is the high degree of evaporation, that arrives 80%. However, of 20% remains alone 1% of the water of rains are used to advantage. “We have 70 a thousand dams in the region, with bigger capacity fifteen times of what the Bay of the Guanabara. Essa água seria suficiente para todos os usos, mas faltam adutoras e obras complementares para distribuição, o que evitaria o desperdício com a evaporação, pois as águas não ficariam paradas. Moreover, it has much underground water, that would be enough to supply all the population northeastern ", evaluates.

The numbers presented for Bonfim show that the transposition would be really unnecessary. The project foresees the shunting line of 2 billion cubical meters of water of the San Francisco. The dam of Castanhão, in the Ceará, only accumulates 6 billion cubical meters per year, being that, of these, 2 billion evaporate. Therefore, the amount of water used with the transposition would only compensate what it evaporates in this dam.

“We have two challenges, the first one we are the combat we dry and the other is the convivência with the half-barren one”, argued Luciano Silveira, of the Joint of Half-Barren (WING), in the Paraíba. It said that the first item must perpetuate the industry kept for forces politics, as he requires the application alternative balanced and compatible with the reality of the place.

“Our fight took national and international a dimension, but this place represents the revolt and the resistance of the peoples, who must be understood as a process”, explains Rubens Siqueira, coordinator of the Pastoral Commission of Terra (CPT), that it remembered the diverse moments of mobilization against the transposition, as the occupations during the Red April, the encampment in Cabrobó, the land retaken ones of the Truká peoples, the pilgrimage of the land in Minas Gerais, the occupation of the barrage of Sobradinho, the closing Da Ponte between Juazeiro and Petrolina, beyond solidary manifestations and jejuns, in 2007.

Derli Casali, of the Pequenos Movement Agricultores (MPA), makes an analysis of the performance of great companies in the region. “The Northeast only left of being supplying of cheap man power. Today the capital has natural interest in the strategical resources and goods of caatinga, that she is rich in biodiversity. The transposition has left of this logic of great projects, in the context of the CAP (Program of Acceleration of the growth) and of the IIRSA (Integration of South American Regional Infraestrutura) “.

Luciano Silveira, of the Joint of Half (WING), historically presents a critical one to the model of development adopted in the region, that concentrates land and water. “The problem is of nature politics. It is clearly that for a diffuse population, that suffers with dries, would only function diffuse techniques of water distribution, as successive, underground barrages, watering holes, mandalas and others simple techniques. Caatinga is a great genetic patrimony, but she is being destroyed. She is necessary to rescue to know them local of convivência with Half-Barren. “

The agriculturist Jose Santana, of the MPA, explains that “this model that they call development imposes the cultivation and destroys our way of life. The wisdom of the peasants is an accumulated treasure and needs to fight to remain in the field ". Rita de Cássia, militant of the MPA, complete the argument: “It has plants that they only exist in this region, but our seeds are being stolen for great companies. The challenge of the peasants is to remain in the land, with worthy life ".


Dry San Francisco
Many other depositions denounce the destruction of the San Francisco. In Sergipe, it has stretches where the river is completely dry and the population crosses its stream bed of motion. O professor Manoel Bonfim diz que, em muitos lugares, a água do São Francisco está salgada, pois o rio perdeu sua força contra o mar. In the North of Minas Gerais, fishing count that the pollution of the mineradora Votorantim caused the death of 80 a thousand tons of surubim. “For us, the river is source of life and food. This project of the transposition represents one second settling and the death of the aboriginal peoples ", affirms Marcos Sabarú, representative of the Truká people.

Andréa Zellhuber, of the CPT, says that the high water consumption for the agriculture based on the irrigated monoculture is causing a process of desertificação in the half-barren one and the transposition would aggravate this problem. Another concern is the devastação of the open pasture, where the springs of the San Francisco are located. The erosion of ground of the open pasture cause the assoreamento of the rivers. Today the average depth of the San Francisco is of 1 meter and navigation almost does not exist.

The government has used the argument of the revitalização of the river as “currency of exchange” of the transposition, also with the promise to make the agrarian reform in the region. The ambientalista Enrique Cortez explains that, “If the government to make 6 km of nestings with irrigation, as it promises, will not have water enough to supply the axle north of the project. It is clearly that this is a lie ". For Derli Casali, of the MPA, “the transposition it would make impracticable any attempt of revitalização of the San Francisco, therefore they are antagonistic projects”.

Beyond the conference, other activities with the people of Sobradinho had been organized, that housed the majority of the commission agents of other states. In one of these events, D. Cappio remembered that “this fight is not as a soccer game, that lasts 90 minutes. The fight of the life has the size of our life ".

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PERSONAL UMA CONCLUSÂO

Becomes necessary yes workmanships that affect the peoples of the half-barren one, but workmanships of lesser transport to really take care of to the populations of the region, optimized the existing infrastructure already in the region as dams, making communication between them better to take care of its users.
The attitude of the government when serving purely to the interests of a small group of people and companies in detriment of the collective necessities is condemnable and what it is worse defending in its speech, that the workmanship is in benefits of the populations that can come to be, if the workmanships will be concluded, the most harmed with the exhaustion of the River.