The environmental organization was one of 10 winners in a contest sponsored by Beijing's Economic Observer and Shell Corporation, which recognized groups that designed exemplary sustainable development projects in China.
An appraisal committee of economists, policy makers, NGO leaders, entrepreneurs, and environmentalists, selected the winners from a field of more than 100 contestants.
Green Watershed, an Oxfam America partner since 2000, won praise from the judges for their work in villages around the Lashi Lake. There, government conservation programs and dam developments threaten the livelihoods of local farmers and fishers, many of them ethnic minorities in China.
Based on their research and interviews with villagers, Green Watershed designed a project, which helped the people of Lashi Lake protect their environmental resources and make a living. Now former timber harvesters are growing potatoes, former fishers are nursing fruit trees and Chinese yams, and Yi and Naxi women are attending schools in their villages, learning to read, write and teach others innovative agriculture techniques.
Li Yue-Chun, 55, a Naxi woman, whose family was the first in her village to begin planting fruit trees and Chinese yams, said she now has hope her community will survive.
"Because of the riverway improvements, my land will never be threatened," she said.
Green Watershed is also working to form self-sufficient watershed committees in Lashi villages, which allow local people to advise their government representatives what kinds of plans would work best for them.
"The Lashi project is like a pilot for the whole of China," said Warwick Browne, Lead Regional Program Officer for Oxfam America's Mekong River Basin Management Program. "It represents what watershed management can be."
Dr. Yu Xiaogang, the director of Green Watershed, said the judges recognized the Lashi project because it demonstrated two key requirements. It could be replicated with just a modest amount of funding. And it involved the village's participation.
"They said this is a very alien concept in China—a process that involves the people participating in watershed management," Dr. Yu said.
Green Watershed received 10,000 Yuan (about $1,200) for the March 2005 prize.
]]>My grandmother told us that we were many, many Secoyas, between the Rio Napo and Putamayo, near the frontier with Colombia. We must have been over 8,000 there?
At the time of the Spanish conquest many people died from measles and mumps. And even when my grandma was a little girl, she had to escape into the jungle to avoid such terrible diseases. She said that nobody came to help them; people were dying in their houses, like chickens.
Then came the rubber boom. The rubber producers held the Secoyas as slaves. Many Secoyas drank poison to liberate themselves from the indignity of forced labor. Others fled deeper into the jungle.
After all this dislocation the Secoyas regrouped in about 1970. We were only 120 people. And those remaining 120 people, along with their children and grandchildren, were the ones who had to endure the impact of the oil companies. And of those 120, I was one.
This is to contextualize what is happening today. These 120 continue to suffer. Two [just] died of cancer, and eight years ago more people died of cancer. So we wonder, for those 120 native people and their descendants, if our days are numbered too; if some sickness will take us instead of a natural death. This is to say that life is uncertain now.
The oil companies have had a significant cultural impact, especially on our territory. How we used to live—naturally, that is—is no longer natural. We are experiencing the impact of many other cultures, especially from [modern-day migration]. Before we didn't need money because we had everything we needed. There were animals and fish; there was fruit, and medicines. Everything was found in the forest. But now we must go out to buy everything.
We also need to buy notebooks and school supplies. We are now surrounded by school walls in order to learn. The education beforehand for the Secoyas began at four in the morning. The elderly people in the community worked with the young people, teaching them weaving. They also told stories, legends, which taught respect for older people.
Though we agree that education should take place in the classroom, we are not in agreement that the only thing that should be taught is what the government decides should be taught. We see that we are not educating ourselves and our children in the way that our ancestors taught us. In that sense we are losing our culture. Now the youth doesn't know about our legends and our stories and our customs. And this is why now, through our own bilingual education, we are trying to reintegrate our own values, our own cultures, and our own traditions into our education.
Another great impact is on the environment. For example, we no longer have animals because one step behind the oil companies came the colonists. And every time the colonists found an animal they had to shoot it, they had to kill it. [The animals] withdrew farther and farther away. And now we no longer have territories in which we have everything we need around us; in which we can go from one side to the other. Everything has its owner. Now there are other communities—Shuar communities and Kichwa communities—which were ours before. This is a reduction of our territory. Right now we're enclosed and circumscribed by different pacts. There is one pact with the oil company; the African palm company [harvesting hearts of palm]; the colonists; even other indigenous people who have migrated here from their ancestral homes in other provinces.
What has really damaged us is the pollution in the rivers. This is really the worst part, along with the contamination in the air and the earth itself on which we cultivate our plants and our food. These are the terrible effects that have been visited upon us.
Although we talk about remediation, I think it will be difficult to repair what has been damaged. I think perhaps we will never be able to, because even though we might repair the natural environment, modern society is here among us—on our doorstep—and we will never be able to repair that.
We have seen many new sicknesses that we didn't see in our people before. We the Secoyas knew how to cure ourselves when those sicknesses were natural sicknesses. But now, with these unknown diseases, not even the best healer among us knows how to cure them. I think if we don't now have people who really know how to cure those previously unknown diseases, if we don't resolve this case against Texaco, then the very few Secoyas that remain—about 400 of us—will lose our culture and we may be finished off by sickness or disease. Or for other reasons we will disappear bit by bit. This is what I can tell you about the impact of the oil industry on the Secoya people.
Yes there is a hope for us, in the way that we have been organizing around Texaco because the Sionas, Secoyas, and Cofanes, we are the ones who have lived here in Sucumbios. We are the original owners of these territories and we have seen all of the damage that has been done here. So we organized through some friendly organizations—they came and told us about human rights—before we knew nothing about human rights. And through friends and allies the Sionas, Secoyas, Cofanes, and Kichwas started to organize in order to bring justice to this case.
We, as one part of the affected people, believe that since we have already waited 10 years [while the case languished in the United States courts]; we could wait and continue another 10 years if necessary. This is our priority. People are saying: "If we don't get this resolved, what are we doing? If we can't drink the water from our traditional sources—then what?"
So we are newly united since the case has been presented in a court here, and now we are just waiting for the judge's decisions. We are assisted by Oxfam America and other people. We feel we are engaging in common work to ensure a future for the people who are in danger of disappearing.
We can't waste time being sorry about what has happened. We have to be able to defend and exercise the same rights as Spanish-speaking mestizo people do in our own territory.
]]>?We applaud the efforts of Senator Boxer to advance the Climate Security Act. This landmark piece of legislation is a significant step forward in Congressional action on climate change. We especially appreciate Senator Boxer?s leadership on addressing the human impacts of climate change, which pose one of the greatest threats in the 21st century to the lives and livelihoods of billions of people who live in poverty.
?We are pleased that Senator Boxer?s substitute amendment to the Climate Security Act ensures funding to help poor people adapt to the unavoidable consequences of climate change. As this bill recognizes, it is critical that funding be provided to actively engage local communities in the most vulnerable countries around the world. The bill also takes a step toward promoting a sustainable energy pathway for people around the world.
?We applaud the commitment to substantially increase international adaptation funding over the lifetime of the bill. Efforts to address the already serious impacts of climate change on vulnerable communities?including floods, drought, and disease?are desperately needed as soon as possible. We look forward to working with Senator Boxers and other senators to strengthen the bill by significantly increasing funding for this critical need before 2018.
?Additionally, the emissions reduction strategy should be strengthened to ensure that greenhouse gas reductions are in line with what the scientific consensus says is needed to avoid catastrophic consequences for poor people. The bill could also do more to guarantee that low-income energy consumers and vulnerable communities in the United States are adequately protected.?
?The Senate has an opportunity to address the climate crisis for poor communities around the world. That opportunity should be seized.?
]]>The Extractive Industry Transparency Disclosure (EITD) Act of 2008 introduced today would require oil, gas, and mining companies to publicly disclose payments made to foreign governments. With more than half of the world?s poorest people living in countries rich in natural resources, this legislation would provide citizens with vital information to hold their governments accountable for how these so-called ?extractive industry? revenues are used.
?Corruption and mismanagement thrive in environments characterized by secrecy. Access to information is a fundamental aspect of development,? says Raymond C. Offenheiser, president of Oxfam America. ?Representative Frank has taken an important step to ensure that communities know how mining and oil projects will impact their lives and lands and how money generated for their governments can contribute to the long-term reduction of poverty.?
With record high oil prices and diminishing reserves, companies are increasingly operating in new areas of developing regions, including West Africa, the Amazon basin, and Southeast Asia. Given the weakness of government oversight in many of these countries, it is even more important that oil and mining companies be transparent. In Angola, for example, more than $4 billion in state oil revenues could not be accounted for between 1997 and 2002?an amount roughly equal to the entire sum spent on social programs by foreign donors and the government in the same years.
Countries dependent on oil and mineral wealth also face a much higher rate of internal conflict and violence. In Africa?s Great Lakes region?which includes parts of Burundi, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania?five million people were killed in violent conflicts in the last decade, most of which were directly and indirectly funded by resource extraction.
?It is no secret that lack of transparency in the extractive industry often goes hand-in-hand with government corruption and internal conflict. The industry suffers as a result with company investments at risk and higher energy prices for consumers,? said Offenheiser. ?This legislation would foster accountability in nations where secrecy has undermined development, democracy, and human rights.?
The EITD Act would apply not only to US companies, but to all oil, gas, and mining companies registered with the US Securities Exchange Commission (SEC). This includes European companies, such as Shell and BP, as well as those in emerging markets like China, India, Brazil, and Russia. Like the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977 and the National Environmental Protection Act of 1969, this legislation could have a ripple effect around the world and would be an important complement to voluntary initiatives that may take hold in only a few countries.
?This legislation is an opportunity for the US to take leadership in the international community,? said Offenheiser. ?Mandatory revenue disclosure has the power to weed out corruption in developing countries making way for stability and real solutions to poverty that the oil, gas, and mining industries can support.?
Oxfam America is working in support of the EITD Act by calling on international extractive companies to show their respect for communities? right to revenue information as well as their right to decide whether they want companies to begin or expand operations on their land.
?Revenue disclosure will give communities the tools they need to have a say in how extractive projects affect their lands and livelihoods. If communities know how much extractive companies are paying their governments for natural resources, they can advocate for a fair share of the benefits to address community needs like education, health care, and jobs,? said Offenheiser.
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