A week ago, Cultural Survival received a letter from Frente de Defensa de la Amazonia , signed by Luis Yanza, in which they - the human rights organizations and representatives of other social groups - were concerned about the violence that might occur during protests against Ecuador disastrous fiscal policies. They were right: Five people died from confrontations with the army in Orellana and Sucumbios.
A year ago, the auction of another swathe of land in Amazonian Ecuador constituted the latest sale -- part of an ongoing process known as "block leasing" -- in which 13 blocks had already been auctioned. The main claimer: oil industries. The seller: the government. The victims: biodiversity and indigenous peoples.
Thirty years after Texaco first began drilling it is apparent that diverse native ethnic minorities with previous populations numbering in thousands, have been reduced to mere hundreds or have become extinct. Such is the case for the Huaoranis and Cofans. The Tetetes tribe no longer exists. This is entirely due to the depredations and the pollution caused by the settlement of oil companies in the Ecuadorian lands that form part of the Amazon Basin . Reports on human rights -- coming from On the Record -- tell of the contamination of water there and the resulting sickness of indigenous peoples, as well as the endangerment of around five percent of all the plant species on Earth.
Still, there are numerous supporters of oil, underlining their view of the fuel is the major source of revenue in Amazonia . According to them, earnings from oil industries are extremely important in Ecuador. The selling of the new block will generate -- according to Petroecuador, the state-owned oil company -- $200 million in revenue and private investments. Already, oil sales provide around 40 percent of Ecuador's income. But supporters do not talk only about money: they even argue that the presence of indigenous people within worldwide political discourse is due to the power they themselves have accrued from oil industries.
However, those "benefits" are clearly offset by the devastation of natural resources, the loss of Ecuador's indigenous cultures and the increased impoverishment of its peoples.
Firstly, the arrival of over 250,000 settlers, and the pollution and destruction of the jungle so as to build roads and pipelines cutting straight into it, overwhelm the indigenous cultures. This is obviously an influx that indigenous people, once populous in eight different nations --some of whom had been living there even before the Incas arrived – are not ready to be hosts. Their health alone indicates this fact: the Ecuadorian town of San Carlos has one of the highest rates of cancer in the country.
Secondly, this very encroachment of pollution, colonists, roads and pipelines has promoted the exodus of indigenous peoples to the big cities in Ecuador. There, they live in a very poor conditions, exacerbated by the increasing impoverishment of the country in general. A few figures highlight the scale of the problem: According to the government of Ecuador and Latinamerica Press, cited in an On the Record report, "inflation has doubled in less than ten years, and over 70 per cent of the population now lives in poverty". Of these, 40 percent are indigenous.
