Day 239 - 23 Apr 96 - Page 08

     
     1        people or corporations who have made money by other means
     2        and have turned to ranching as an auxillary business.  They
     3        include some of Brazil's largest companies, some of which
     4        operate in their own names, others of which operate through
     5        subsidiaries.  I understand that there is signature foreign
     6        investment in ranching in the Amazon. It is generally hard
     7        to trace, as much of the foreign money is believed to be
     8        channelled through Brazilian companies.
     9
    10        C. The motives:  Until the late 1980s, cattle ranching in
    11        the Brazilian Amazon was only secondarily pursued for the
    12        purposes of beef production.  The primary reasons were
    13        government subsidies and appreciation in the value of
    14        land.  Ranchers and landowners in Brazil enjoy high status
    15        and, in my cases, political power.  The ranches did produce
    16        beef, nearly all of which, I understand, is consumed within
    17        Brazil, and it would have contributed to the financial
    18        viability of their use of the land, but it was not the
    19        major source of funds.  Today, through the introduction of
    20        new techniques and new grass varieties, beef production in
         the Amazon can be commercially viable.  There are no longer
    22        any significant subsidies for ranching in the Amazon and
    23        the boom in land prices appears, for now, to be over.  Some
    24        taxation and land allocation policies still appear to
    25        favour the clearance of ranchland from the forest, and it
    26        receives a considerable effective subsidy from the timber
    27        industry."
    28
    29   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   Just pause there.  At the end of the fourth
    30        line there, Mr. Monbiot, "nearly all of the beef is
    31        consumed within Brazil".  Is that still so, or was it still
    32        so at the time of your statement?
    33        A.   My understanding is that some of the beef occasionally
    34        is exported, but there are general restrictions operating
    35        in Brazil due to the presence of Foot and Mouth Disease
    36        which means that it is often difficult for Brazil to export
    37        to countries such as the US and the EC.  It appears that,
    38        certainly from the McDonald's statements that I have seen,
    39        from time to time, consignments do get through so they must
    40        have some sort of sanitary procedure, I would imagine,
         which allows them to get a licence to export, but, no, it
    42        is true that the great majority of that beef would be
    43        consumed within Brazil.
    44
    45   MR. MORRIS:  Do you know if that was the intention?
    46        A.   From the historical research I have done, it seems
    47        very clear that the pioneering effort in the Amazon, which
    48        was a very idealistic and not very realistic one, was aimed
    49        at making the Amazon, and this phrase is used repeatedly,
    50        "the bread basket of the world", and that time and again 
    51        the people responsible for the pioneering effort, 
    52        politicians and big businessmen, and the rest of it, would 
    53        say that what they were going use the Amazon for was to
    54        make Brazil a massive exporter of food and they genuinely
    55        believed this; I do not think it was just rhetoric, and
    56        they saw it as a great lush green jungle which, because it
    57        could support so many trees, and so much natural
    58        vegetation, clearly could support a great deal of
    59        agricultural activities.
    60