Conference turris::womannotes-v2

Eight things you can do to help the rainforests:

1. Don't eat fast-food made with rainforest beef.  Avoid fast-food burger,
roast beef sandwiches, tacos and fajitas made from imported beef raised
on grazing land cleared from rainforests.  It's the major cause of rainforest
destruction in Central America. Before you ask "Where's the beef?" ask where
it's from.  If it isn't home grown, chances are it's rainforest beef.

2. Don't buy tropical wood products.  Skip the teak and mahogany furniture.
Tell your friends and family that we can live without toilet seats made
from tropical hardwoods.  If you're a carpenter or building contractor,
don't buy plywood made from timber clearcut from rainforests.

3. Help protect indigenous tribes and environmental activists who ar putting
their lives on the line to save the rainforest.  The only thing that stands
between repressive Third World regimes and rainforest activists is you.
Worldwide outcry recently helped free Malaysian activists jailed for protesting
the clearcutting of the world's oldest rainforest by commercial loggers.
Right now, two Kayapo Indians and a U.S. anthropologist in Brazil are being
prosecuted for protesting construction of a giant dam in the Amazon.  Send
the letter in the following reply to the President of Brazil.

4. Tell the World Bank to stop funding rainforst-killing development projects
with your taxes.  Right now, the "Brazil Power Sector II" loan package to
finance rainforest-killing hydroelectric dams is being considered by the
World bank.  The dams are costly boondoggles (usually destroyed in ten years
by corrosion and silt) that drown thousands of acres of rainforests, desplace
indigenous tribes and saddle developing countries with a permanent mountain
of debt, mortgaging their futures to U.S. and Japanese banks.  Send the
letter in the following reply to the President of the World Bank urging him to
stop financing rainforest dams and fund small-scale projects that benefit
rainforests and their inhabitants instead.

5. Help break the "Circle of Poison" by writing your representatives now.
American companies are allowed to export deadly pesticides banned the U.S. to
Third World countries for use in export agriculture.  Right now, in an effort
to eradicate coca plants in Peru, the U.S. State Department is using highly
toxic herbicides near the Amazon headwaters, killing rare rainforest plants and
animals downstream,  poisoning rivers and contaminating the food-growing
topsoil of peasant farmers for years to come.  Cancer-causing pesticides end up
back in the U.S. on American dinner tables in the form of insoluble residue on
imported food.  Send the letter in the following reply telling your
representatives in Washington to break the "Circle of Poison" now.

6. Help put out the raging Amazon fires.  The World Bank-financed Cuiaba-Port
Velho highway opened up fragile Amazon rainforests to ranchers and timber
barons who clear rainforest by burning.  NASA satellites spotted 170,000
fires in the Brazilian province of Rondonia last year, which has lost nearly
twenty percent of its rainforst, considered one of the richest eco-systems
in the world.  The fires in Rondonea alone account for ten percent of the
globle output of carbon dioxide, the main cause of the Greenhouse Effect,
the catastrophic warming of the earth's climate.  Send the letter in the
following reply to the General Secretary of the UN Environmental Programme
asking for an emergency session to plan global action to put out the Amazon
fires.

7. Talk to other about saving the rainforests.  Send your name and address
to the following address and we'll send you back information of rainforests,
including World Rainforest Week (October 9-16).  Learn more.  Talk to others.
Rainforest destruction starts here and can be stopped here...but only if
enough of us get involved.

		Public Media Center
		"Rainforest"
		466 Green Street, Suite 300
		San Francisco, CA  94133-9983

8. Register and vote!  Decisions made in Washington, D.C. during the next
four years will determine the fate of rainforests around the world.  Make
sure the people who represent you in Washington -- in Congress, the U.S.
Sentate, and the White House -- share your concern about rainforests.  At
the present rate of destruction, we can't afford four years of official
U.S. indifference or inaction.  We need our government on the side of
rainforest preservation, not rainforest destruction.  This November, your
vote will make a big difference.  Register and vote.

Your involvement is vital to the survival of the rainforests.  Join the
fight for rainforest survival.  Make your voice heard in the battle to 
save the tropical rainforests.  Fill out postcards with the following
information and mail them.  Act now!



SEND TO:

Hon. Gus Yatran
Chairman
House Subcommittee on Human Rights
B258 Rayburn House Office Bldg.
Washington, D.C. 20515


Representative Yatran:

	The International Cultural Survival Act of 1988 (H.R. 4738) will
protect and promote cultural survival throughout the world by requiring the
U.S. government to promote the rights of indigenous or tribal peoples' rights
and livelihood.  The bill will insure that no U.S. tax dollars are used to
adversely affect indigenous people.  The fate of millions of indigenous people
-- and the rainforest environments they live in harmony with -- depend upon 
their survival.  I'm sending a copy of this card to my Congressional
representative.  Please keep me posted on the bill's progress.  Thank you.

Sincerely,


__________________________________________________________________________
NAME
__________________________________________________________________________
ADDRESS
__________________________________________________________________________
CITY					STATE			ZIP



NEXT


SEND TO:

Exmo. Sr. Jose Sarney
Presidente da Republica
Palacia do Planalto
70 000 Brasilia DF, Brazil



President Sarney:

	The best measure of any government is the respect it has for those who
disagree with it.  Your government is prosecuting two Kayapo Indians and an
American anthropologist for holding a press conference and meetings with
World Bank officials in which they objected to the construction of hydro-
electric dams in the Amazon because of their environmental and social 
consequences.  Your government has a stewardship responsibility to safeguard
the Amazon rainforests, one of the earth's premiere biological resources.  It
also has the responsibility to respect and protect th rights of individuals to
speak out -- whether in protest or agreement.  Stop the prosecution of the
Kayapo Indians and the American anthropologist.  Protect the Brazilian
rainforests.  The whole world is watching.  Please respond.  Thank you.

Sincerely

__________________________________________________________________________
NAME
__________________________________________________________________________
ADDRESS
__________________________________________________________________________
CITY					STATE			ZIP


NEXT


SEND TO:

Rep.
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D,C, 20515


Rep_________________________________:

	It's time to stop the export of toxic U.S. pesticides and herbicides
so dangerous they are banned from use here.  The dumping of toxic pesticides 
in developing contries threatens human health and rainforest environments.  
The toxic pesticides and herbicides are used mainly for growing food for 
export on land cleared from rainforests.  The deadly, cancer-causing pesticides
return to the U.S. as toxic, insoluble residue on imported food, ultimately
eaten by unsuspecting Americans.  Only Congressional action can break this
vicious "Circle of Poison" that defoliates and destroys the rainforest, 
poisons the precious topsoil in developing countries and threatens the health
of farmworkers in the Third World and consumers here at home.  Let me know
what you intend to do to stop the dumping of banned pesticides and herbicides 
by U.S. companies.

Sincerely

__________________________________________________________________________
NAME
__________________________________________________________________________
ADDRESS
__________________________________________________________________________
CITY					STATE			ZIP


NEXT


SEND TO:

Anne Wrobleski
Deputy Secretary for International Narcotic Matters
US Department of State
2201 "C" Street, N.W.
Washington, D,C, 20520


Ms. Wrobleski:

	The U.S. effort to eradicate coca plants in the Peruvian jungle with
toxic herbicides is also killing rare tropical rainforest plants and animals. 
Toxic chamicals sprayed in this area contaminate the headwaters of the 
Amazon River nearby, poisoning plant, animal and human life downstream, 
including the topsoil of the Peruvian peasant farmers used to grow food.  
The U.S. war on drugs shouldn't be a war against the rainforest.  It's 
time to find better ways to fight drugs besides the wholesale poisoning of the
earth's premiere biological resource which is essential to our survival.  
I'm sending a copy of this postcard to my Congressional representative.  
Please respond immediately.
Sincerely

__________________________________________________________________________
NAME
__________________________________________________________________________
ADDRESS
__________________________________________________________________________
CITY					STATE			ZIP


NEXT


SEND TO:

Mr. Barber J. Conable, Jr.
President
WORLD BANK
1818 H Street, N.W.
Washington, D,C, 20433


Mr. Conable:

	Stop using my tax dollars to build large dams in tropical rainforests.
The dams financed by the World Bank are destroying the earth's atmosphere,
accelerating the Greenhouse Effect and threatening half of all life on earth.
For the indigenous people living in the rainforests, your dams mean
dislocation, desolation and death.  Stop all loans for large dams and begin
instead making loans for small-scale development projects that promote
sustainable use of the tropical rainforest and protest the rights of 
rainforest tribal people.
Sincerely

__________________________________________________________________________
NAME
__________________________________________________________________________
ADDRESS
__________________________________________________________________________
CITY					STATE			ZIP


NEXT


SEND TO:

Mostafa Kamal Tolba
Executive Director
UNITED NATIONS ENVIRONMENT PROGRAMME
P.O. Box 30552
Nairobi, Kenya

Mr. Tolba:

	The raging fires in the Amazon province of Rondonia in Brazil must
be put out now.  NASA Satellites spotted 170,000 fires in Rondonia last
year, set mostly by cattle ranchers and timber companies who clear land from
the rainforest by burning.  Nearly twenty percent of the Rondonia rainforest
-- considered one of the richest eco-systems in the world -- has been 
destroyed.  The Amazon fires produce ten percent of the global production of 
carbon dioxide, the main cause of the Greenhouse Effect, the catastropic
warming of the earth's climate.  It's time for the United Nations to 
convene an emergency session to plan global action to extinguish the 
Amazon fires now.  We can't afford delay

Sincerely

__________________________________________________________________________
NAME
__________________________________________________________________________
ADDRESS
__________________________________________________________________________
CITY					STATE			ZIP

    <--(.3)
    
    Mike, did you mean to sound so snide?
    
    						=maggie

    I think Mike has an interesting observation, though.  In addition
    to his contention (which I support) that it is VERY difficult to
    get the information one needs to make an accurate determination.
    This case is orders of magnitude greater than the problem faced
    by those who wanted to boycott Procter and Gamble a few years back
    - do YOU know which products you buy are made by P+G and which aren't?
    Surveys showed that more than half the people asked (who said they
    were supporting the boycott) didn't know.
    
    Also, boycotts are horribly ineffective means for social change
    - especially when the response is at the noise level, as it would
    be for the suggestion to boycott "fast food burgers".
    
    A better idea would be to write a letter to the companies in question,
    explaining your concerns and asking for their support.  This kind
    of direct involvement at least gets your message across directly,
    rather than, for example, McDonalds wondering why their sales are
    up 24.999999999% instead of 25.00000000%.
    
    A final note - form letters and cards, as suggested in earlier replies,
    tend to get ignored.  Individually written and worded letters are
    far more effective.
    
    				Steve
    
    P.S.  Please don't actually urge boycotts of specific firms using
    Digital's network.  This is considered "soliciting" and is one of
    the listed "examples of misuse" in the corporate policy about use
    of the network.

Note 208.3                 

>	You might also mention not to drive your cars because the
>    sulphur emmisions are a part of the acid rain problem, and that
>    also contributes to rain forest problems.
>    
>    	And don't buy any products whose manufacture or use causes
>    CO2 or CFC or methane to enter the atmosphere, since they are
>    greenhouse gases and they conrtibute to the global warming effect
>    which is responsible for weather patter changes that will eventually
>    dry up the rain forests.
>    
>    	And ... get the idea?

     No, I don't get the idea.  Do you have any conception of how important
     this issue is?  

>    	Plus, how do you know what beef came from where?

     Ask.    


Note 208.6                 

>    P.S.  Please don't actually urge boycotts of specific firms using
>    Digital's network.  This is considered "soliciting" and is one of
>    the listed "examples of misuse" in the corporate policy about use
>    of the network.

     No specific firms were mentioned.  Gee, it sure is a good thing we have
     you men around to keep an eye on us.  

Mary

>    >    	Plus, how do you know what beef came from where?
>
>     Ask.    

    You think the people behind the counter know? I doubt it.
    
>     No specific firms were mentioned.  Gee, it sure is a good thing we have
>     you men around to keep an eye on us.  

    Gee, sure is a good thing we have you woman around to show us that
    it isn't just men who make sexist comments.
    
    				Alfred    

    C'mon folks, please?  We're all in this together, remember.
    
    						=maggie

    The rainforests are really in desperate need of help.  It affects
    us all.  There's no need to nit pick each other.
    
    		Dave

    I asked at McDonalds and the manager told me, "We get our
    hamburgers from a warehouse in Pittsburg.  They truck them in once
    a week."
    
    I asked him where the cows that made the hamburgers were raised
    and he said, "I don't know.  On a farm, I suppose."
    
    What countries are we talking about?  Most imported American
    beef is from Australia or Argentina; the Australian ranches
    aren't near the rainforest and I didn't think the Argentinian
    ones were, either.
    
    --bonnie 

    Re: .7
    
    I never suggested that anyone had actually named specific companies
    - I was just offering an opinion about something that might be on
    someone's mind, having seen calls for boycotts in other conferences.
    I had hoped that reading all of my note would make it clear that
    I was trying to offer constructive suggestions for improving the
    impact of people's concern.
    
    					Steve

    Would we be further along by urging that imports of meat from, e.g.,
    Brasil be banned?  I should think that without a large export market,
    it would be economically undesirable to clearcut the rain forests.
    
    At a higher level of aggregation, of course, the real problem we
    should be addressing is the overpopulation that drives this sort
    of "solution".  If the world's population could be brought to a
    steady state, many ecological problems would, I think, go away or
    at least be much reduced.  A good start might be to get the news
    media to grasp the difference between a decline in population and
    a decline in the rate of increase of the population.
    
    						=maggie

    FYI - there is a conference devoted to environmental issues 
    (WASHDC::ENVIRONMENTAL_ISSUES). Press KP7 to add it to your
    notebook.
    
    Not to derail discussion here or anything - but one does want to
    do one's part to conserve computer resources, right?
    
    -b

Boston Globe Thursday October 13, 1988

	Brazil, under fire, vows to protect Amazon area

  SAO PAULO - Brazil, which has a third of the world's rain forests, yesterday
said it would act to protect the Amazon region after a international outcry
over the rapid destruction of the region.  President Jose Sarney said the
government was restrictiong official subsidies for agriculture in the region,
where farmers have started fires on such a large scale that scientists are
worried about the effects on the global climate.

  In his first televised speech devoted to the environment, Sarney also
announced a ban on the export of logs and said all agricultural and industrial
projects would in future be subject to rigorous environmental controls.
"Our forests, our rivers, our fauna and flora are part of the national
Brazilian patrimony," and inheritance "which we cannot allow to disintegrate,"
he said.

  Brazil's best-known ecological activist, Jose Lutzenberger, said on
television yesterday:  "If we destroy Amazonia we are destroying the climate
of the planet."  This year an area the size of West Germany is expected to go
up in flames.  Scientists say fires in the vast region are producing one-tenth
of the carbon dioxide rising into the atmosphere.  Carbon dioxide is the
principal component of the greenhouse effect believed to be warming the earth's
climate.

  The government measures, which include establishing six working groups,
were clearly a response to a wave of strong foreign criticism over Brazil's
treatment of the forests and its Indian inhabitants, many scientists and
environmentalists said.  Fabio Feldmann, the lone congressman elected on an
environmental ticket, said pressures from the World Bank and the Internation
Monetary Fund, major lenders to Brazil, had played a role in persuading the
government to act.  "The authorities are understanding for the first time that
the criticisms are not empty criticisms.  This is very important," Aziz
Ab-Saber, a brazilian scientist, said in an interview.

  Sarney said nothing about new funding for environmental protection in
Amazonia and some ecologists said the government has yet to show it is truly
committed to saving the forests.  The Brazilian Institute of Forest
Development, entrusted with protecting the country's flora and fauna, is
underfunded and understaffed.  Nor did the president address the problem of
mercury pollution in Amazonia. Hundreds of thousands of prospectors are using
mercury to seperate gold from ore and are poisoning rivers throughout the
Amazon basin.

  Sarney defended the government's record on Indian rights,  saying 10 percent
of national territory has been given over to Indian reserves and Brazilian
Indians had far more land per person than those in the United States.  Survival
International, a London-based group, has been picketing Brazilian embassies in
a dozen countries this week and has accused Brazil of genocide in its treatment
of the Yanomani Indians in the northern rain forests, whose land has been
overrun this year by gold miners.  Sarney said the government had a special
concern for the Yanomani.  "The position of the government is firm and hard in
defense of the lands of the Yanomani from the gold prospectors." he told
foreign journalists yesterday.

    On NPR last night, a commentator from an environmentalist group
    argued that while it is a necessary first step, it isn't yet
    substantive as the government has voted no money for implementation.
    
    						=maggie

Maybe we'll have to write Mr. Sarney a few more letters.

		Dave

re Note 208.13 by RAINBO::TARBET:

>     Would we be further along by urging that imports of meat from, e.g.,
>     Brasil be banned?  I should think that without a large export market,
>     it would be economically undesirable to clearcut the rain forests.
>   
>     At a higher level of aggregation, of course, the real problem we
>     should be addressing is the overpopulation that drives this sort
>     of "solution".  

I have two problems with this.  One is that even if the population of Brazil
(and other developing countries) were to stop growing, there still would be
much pressure within those countries to exploit the indigenous natural
resources.  There still would be pressure to raise the standard of living, and
there still would be the need to raise funds to pay off foreign debts.  (And
yes, folks, this is a preview of our future, too.)

The problem I have with a import ban is that this shifts the burden on the
relatively disadvantaged tropical nations and allows us to continue with our
highly consumptive society with no more inconvenience than perhaps a slight
rise in the cost of beef.  That just isn't fair, and the Brazilians would be
justified to be angry at such a move by the "developed" nations.

Bob